Poet Laureate Puts Rhymes Online
U.S. P'et Laureate Billy Collins has launched a new Web site, P'etry 180 at www.loc.gov/p'etry/180, to encourage the appreciation and enjoyment of p'etry in America's high schools. The site is featured on the Library of Congress' home page. The p'et laureateship is an appointed office within the Library of Congress' Scholarly Programs Office.
The site contains the text of 180 p'ems - one for each day of the school year - which Collins selected. The site also suggests different ways to present a p'em in a school setting, as well as guidance on how to read a p'em aloud. Most of the p'ems were written by contemporary American authors and were selected with a high school audience in mind. The p'ems were chosen to be accessible upon a first hearing, although students can download them from the Web site for later reading.
Collins encourages students and educators to select someone to read a new p'em from the site each day. "The hope is that p'etry will become a part of the daily life of students in addition to being a subject that is part of the school curriculum," he writes. Library of Congress, Washington, DC, (202) 707-5394, www.loc.gov.