Got a poem in your pocket? Seattle’s Civic Poet does, sort of

Just about every day now has a special observance associated with it. Among other things, April 30th is National Honesty Day, apparently a counterbalance to April Fools' Day. It's also Poem in Your Pocket Day, a capstone to National Poetry Month put forward by the Academy of American Poets.

“Poetry is meant to travel,” they say. “However you share it, the goal is simple: put a poem into someone else's day.” To help realize that lovely sentiment, KUOW’s Kim Malcolm reached out to Seattle Civic Poet Dujie Tahat.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

Kim Malcolm: The academy encourages people to print out short poems, fold them up to carry in your pocket, and then hand them out to people at work or school or around your community. What do you think of that idea?

Dujie Tahat: I love that idea. I am a strong proponent and advocate of more poems in more places. I think we live in a world where we're sort of surrounded by language, and what poems do is sort of remind us that language is like a material. I think by reminding us that it's a tool and a thing that we use to connect with other people, that sort of brings us closer to the world. More of that is always good.

They also suggest things like adding a poem to your email signature. Do you have any similar ways that you sneak poems into other people's days?

Oh, yeah. Over the course of my life, I've done all sorts of things. I actually on my own would fold origami cranes like little poems and leave them behind. Lately, I feel like my favorite thing to do is to point out, even on like Instagram Reels or when people are just talking, to just say, "That's a poem,” to remind folks that there doesn't have to be this stagnant text-on-page way of thinking about what poetry is and can do.

Another suggestion the academy put forth is reciting a poem out loud somewhere. Since we have you on the line, do you want to share one that you may have folded up in your pocket?

This is not a poem I carry around in my pocket. It is tattooed on my forearm, which is maybe more pocket-y in some ways. It’s called “Let There Be New Flowering,” by Lucille Clifton:

let there be new flowering

in the fields let the fields

turn mellow for the men

let the men keep tender

through the time let the time

be wrested from the war

let the war be won

let love be

at the end

And that's on your forearm?

Yes. My left arm has a couple tattoos and a couple lines from poems. I have an aspiration that over the years it will be like a sleeve of poems and lines that remind me about poems.

And the poem, it's so evocative of spring for me. Do you have a favorite season for poetry, or do they all work for you?

You know, it's hard to beat summer in Seattle as an experience. But I think as far as poems go, I am drawn to, and I feel like most poets might be, spring and fall. Something about the coming back and the death of nature and the cycle, visual changes in the trees, it's like a daily reminder of what's going inside my mind and in my soul on a day-to-day basis.

Listen to the interview by clicking the play button above.