National Poetry Month 2012

Welcome (back), Friend!

For those of you not familiar with my annual poetry project, the premise is as follows:
I have a deck of cards, each card is associated with a particular topic. Every morning in April I will draw a card, write a poem on that topic, and post it here before I go to sleep. Whereas in previous years, there was fluctuation in form controlled by a 20-sided die, this time around there will be one form: 140 characters or less, AKA Tweet Length.

There are three reasons for this choice:
(1) This form has yielded some of the best results in previous years.
(2) I'm making a statement on the struggle to retain emotion and meaning as our language adapts to our ever-progessing world, or whatever.
(3) I'm a busy, busy dude and if I have to write a Sapphic Ode followed by a Hip-Hopera followed by a Sestina, I'm going to not sleep and go crazy.

To increase the randomness that makes this project so successful, I have included a couple of rule-changing curve balls in the form of WILD CARDS. Additionally, all topics were reader submitted, and I have only had access to them for about 24 hours - so my ability to prepare is still minimal.
Without furhter ado, the topics are:

RULE CARD WILD CARD
RED JOKER WILD CARD
2C The Boob Tube
2D Breakfast Television
2S Piper Perabo/Covert Affairs
2H Work in studios all day, listen to NPR on the way home, then get furious at how stupid TV is
3C Old guys using "hip-hop" slang
3D Mike Piazza
3S Living in Santorum's America
3H Peach & chipotle glazed quail
4C Crystal Pepsi
4D 1989
4S Chameleons
4H WILD CARD
5C Spin Doctors
5D Trying to pick someone up at Burger King (AKA The BK Mack)
5S Subway Alliances
5H HeroQuest
6C WILD CARD
6D The Morning After the Wreck (Turner)
6S Racist Hunger Games fans
6H Being dumped for a vampire
7C Primanti Brothers sandwiches
7D Island nations, who they fakin'?
7S The psychological problems of Mighty Mouse
7H The demise of the space shuttle program
8C That point when you don't think you're drunk but you really really are
8D Goldschlager (see above)
8S "You're always happy with your work when you're drinking"
8H That fortune teller at PJ Killroy's
9C Filing down ones teeth only to surgically replace them with worse teeth
9D WILD CARD
9S Otter Genocide
9H High school girlfriend's wedding
10C Office printer/scanner/copiers
10D Female Gladiators
10S WILD CARD
10H Acrimony
JC Crohn's Disease
JD Airport Hellos
JS Public Goodbyes
JH Hotel Sex
QC Ingrid Bergman
QD Dame Maggie Smith
QS Feminist Blogs
QH Ladies Reading
KC Frozen feet on the way to the orchestra
KD "Joseph Kony"
KS Inside Jokes
KH Time Square in the 80s
AC Boston vs. New York
AD The Mets, obviously
AS Theft of the poetic license
AH The life of a barista
ORANGE JOKER WILD CARD
YELLOW JOKER WILD CARD
(I don't know why there are three jokers in this deck)

In addition to daily poems, there will also be weekly peoms, drawn from the same topic pool, but with different form (20-sided die will return!).

A few rule clarifications:
- Once a card is removed from the deck, it will not be put back.
- If on the off-chance that I have to write more poems than topics (it's possible), I will be drawing from some topics that just missed the final cut.

Thanks to all who submitted, thanks to all who continue to read. Enjoy!


P.S. April is also National Grilled Cheese Month

NPM Year 3, Coming Soon

As you've probably noticed, this space has been nothing more than a spam graveyard as of late. Some of the highlights: "Come to see us now to grasp more knowledge and facts anyway," "The entire number of query to be tried is hundred," and "gut mit nützlich und angenehm."

Well, this is all about to change.

The third annual National Poetry Month project is coming here in just a few days! The setup is going to be a little different this year, and one of those differences is that every topic will be reader-submitted.

So get involved! Want me to write about something? Tell me here: putyourcollardownelvis@gmail.com

I'll be checking the above address on March 31st, at which time I will assemble the cream of the crop and post a construct for this year's project.

Thanks for your submissions!

Here are a handful of my favorites from the last two years to keep you occupied until April 1st:
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-11th-bill-clinton.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2011/04/april-13th-whaling-ships.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-28th-pizza_29.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2011/04/april-15th-invisible-people.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-14th-ducks.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-3rd-abroad.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2010/04/april-6th-irrational-fears.html
http://putyourcollardownelvis.blogspot.com/2011/04/april-4th-fat-elvis.html