International Poetry Day 2024: Six ways to celebrate the magic of poetry

Representation Pic

UNESCO declared March 21 as the World Poetry Day in 1999 to celebrate the joy and beauty of poetry, calling it "humanity's purest and most generous form of artistic expression." We've curated a list of easy-to-follow prompts for all poets and poetry lovers in Mumbai.

1 Set up an IG Live reading: If you have a collection of poems saved on your laptop or buried in the back pages of your notebook, open Instagram live and read them out to your friends. You can also ask some of them to join in and share a poem or two. Alternatively, you could experiment with reels and upload a short poem.

Young poets scribble poems together at a Bandra cafe

2 Spin a yarn with friends on Threads/X: Write the first line of a new poem as a thread post or a tweet, and ask your friends to build the poem from there. Ultimately, you'll have a long collaborative poem that you and your friends would have ‘threaded' together. The two platforms - X and Threads - are ideal for such collaborations because they allow others to continue where you left. Give the game a fun hashtag.

3 Listen to a poetry podcast: It might be time to listen to that poetry podcast you had saved months ago. You can also create a cool Spotify playlist for your friends by adding readings from your favourite poets. If you want to make it more fun, curate a playlist of your favourite poetry videos or films, invite a few friends over, and cast them on TV. The World Poetry Festival's YouTube channel has a 24-hour marathon running as well and poets from across the world are reading their poems; stream it.

Pair your read with chai and snacks. Pic Courtesy/Bombay Poetry Crawl

4 Write a poem beginning with "I believe": If you haven't had a moment to sit and write a poem in a while, today is the best day to do it. Write on your commute back home or on your way to work, on your morning walk, your coffee break, or at midnight before you hit the bed. Begin your poem with the phrase "I believe". Where would you take the poem? What makes you feel sure-footed? What keeps you going every day?

5 Organise a reading in a park: Parks and public gardens are ideal spaces to come together and read poems, away from the burden of work at home or in the office. Step out with your friends and read poems. It's a great way to spread the joy of poetry with strangers out for their evening strolls too.

6 Buy a poetry book from a local store: If you want to do none of the above, and just read a magical book of poems, walk into a local bookstore, pick up a collection of poems you haven't heard of or have been meaning to read for a while. Alternatively, borrow a book from a friend. If you haven't met them in a while, gift them one. Turn it into a sweet book exchange.

BONUS TIP: Submit to a journal or sign up for a poetry reading. Have you been wanting to do this? Sharpen your pencils, make those final edits, and get going!

Howl on canvas in a Colaba art space

IF you are looking for a touch of visual poetry to go with verse, drop by this exhibition at APRE Art House that brings together the works of TS Eliot and Allen Ginsberg in the visual context of artworks by nine artists. "Titled Measuring Life With Coffee Spoons, the exhibition is inspired by two key works namely Eliot's The Love Song of Alfred J Prufrock and Ginsberg's Howl," says gallerist and curator Prerna Jain. These works will also be viewed in accompaniment with a few verses recited from the poems, she notes. For one of the artists Megha Joshi, both Eliot and Ginsberg have been part of her years growing up. "I quote him [Eliot] quite often. While the two are extremely different in terms of style, they have the commonality of angst, ennui that speaks to the modern situation." Describing her work as something that evokes the general feeling conveyed through these poems, she notes, "It is an attempt by artists to use the language of these works to express their frustrations with the world."

From Today; 6 pm onwards
At APRE Art House, Sanghvi House, Colaba.
Call 8169458870

- Shriram Iyengar

The Guide's top poetry collections

>> Three Women in a Single-Room House by K Srilata
>> Varavara Rao: A Life in Poetry (translated by N Venugopal & Meena Kandasamy)
>> Icelight by Ranjit Hoskote
>> The White Shirts of Summer by Mamang Dai
>> My Invented Land by Robin Ngangom
>> Wild Women by Arundhathi Subramaniam