When I walk through bookstores, old or new, eyes widen as I creep along the shelves, nose to the bindings and fingertips gently gliding through the air above them. When a book calls to me, my skin tingles. And when I open it for the first time, I hover over its first page, close my eyes, and feel all the possibilities that lie within the bound treasure’s pages.
Poetry books are among some of my favorites. My personal collection includes books by Charles Bukowski, Maya Angelou, Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, William Blake, and Amanda Gorman, among others. I am enamored with how the authors paint with their words and give birth to observations and wonderings with the swish of the pen. For me, writing poetry is a transformative way of recording experiences and observations. While reading it allows me to dip into another person’s perspectives.
Here at Up.St.ART Annapolis, we love discovering poets whose works we’ve never read before. We’re putting out a call for youth poets, ages 18 and under. We’ll select a handful of poems and publish them in the winter 2022 issue.
Guidelines: Poets may submit one to three poems in a Word document by email to UpstartEditor@gmail.com. The email subject should be titled Youth Poetry Submission. Poems should be no more than 40 lines each, including spaces. Include in the Word document the poet’s first and last names, age, email, phone number, and poem title(s) in the upper right of the header.