BOA Blog

Hello readers! Every week, BOA's staff and interns share one of our favorite poems from our over 300 collections of poetry. This week's poem is from Dresses from the Old Country by Laura Read. When You Have Lived a Long Time in One Place things start to vanish. Like the old Newberry’swhere I used to buy earrings that lookedlike tacks, six pairs for a dollar, and thengo sit at the lunch counter with the old peopleeating patty melts and drinking black coffee.They stared in front of them like the womenon the bus with their plastic rain scarvesthat they took from their purses when the...

Hello readers! Every week, BOA's staff and interns share one of our favorite poems from our over 300 collections of poetry. This week's poem is from Holy Moly Carry Me by Erika Meitner. I’ll Remember You As You Were, Not As What You’ll Become If you are fearful, America, I can tell you I am too. I worry about my body—the way, lately, it marches itself over curbs and barriers, lingers in the streets as a form of resistance. The streets belong to no one and everyone and are a guide for motion, but we are so numerous there is no pavement left on which...

Hello readers! Every week, BOA's staff and interns share one of our favorite poems from our over 300 collections of poetry. This week's poem is from Clues from the Animal Kingdom by Christopher Kennedy. Small Hope Factory We were always the hopeful ones, thrilled to find a cigarette stillburning in the grass. It felt good to have a pocket full of changeand nowhere to go. I found a coupon for get one free of something.It didn’t matter what. Payday was magical and came once a week,like church. The world was a poignant and miraculous place. A job,any job, was good and life-affirming.My family was...

Hello readers! Every week, BOA's staff and interns share one of our favorite poems from our over 300 collections of poetry. This week's poem from Mandatory Evacuation by North Carolinian poet Peter Makuck is dedicated to the people affected by Hurricane Florence. Streetlamps The last long streaks of sunlightfinally slipfrom photo cellsatop each poleand one, two, threedown the hillabove the brick street and yellow leavesit begins—not the soft whitehovering and shimmering I sawthose grade school nightson bedroom ceiling and wall,but a harsh, almost purple glow.They’re not angels any morebut keepa kind of faith(flicker though it will)with my parents’ house,the woodstove kitchen,the music and voicesdrifting upstairsto my...

Hello readers! Every week, BOA's staff and interns share one of our favorite poems from our over 300 collections of poetry. This week's poem is from Holy Moly Carry Me by Erika Meitner. No Matter How Many Skies Have Fallen Let’s say we are making a list,and it’s not about how to begood or zombie foreclosuresor anything resembling distresscalls from an airline going downin a cluster of trees. Someonesays, I’ve got a situation here,but they don’t mean that holidaypicture of you dangling handcuffsfrom your index finger or the factthat your mother loved youvery much until we enhancedthe audio. Let’s say we are inviolation of...