From generals to lieutenants, the best military commanders study the lay of the land and the weather ahead of any mission. How steep are the hills? Are the valleys bare of vegetation or thick with vines and trees? What’s the heat index? Is rain likely? Failure to account for these factors can lead to defeat…

Like millions of other immigrants to America, Edgar Albert Guest (1881–1959) worked hard, overcame adversity, made good, and loved the land that gave birth to his dreams and ambitions. He was born in Birmingham, England. In 1891, his mother and father moved the family to Detroit, Michigan. There, at age 11, Guest began working odd…

“Poetry is not my strong suit, I’m no good at writing verse. My prose may be no better, but at least I could do worse.” Oh my gosh, I’m a poet and don’t know it! If it hadn’t been for a couple good English teachers in high school, I might have never read more than…

O sweet wild April/ Came down the Lea,/ Dancing along,/ With his sisters three:/ Carnation, and Rose,/ and tall Lily./ Sing hi,/ Sing hey,/ Sing ho!—William Force Stead April is National Poetry Month—sing hi, sing hey, sing ho! Poetry is such a fun way to spark your children’s interest in words and wordplay. Poems have…

I fled Him, down the nights and down the days; I fled Him, down the arches of the years; I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears I hid from Him, and under running laughter. So begins “The Hound of Heaven.” The narrator of this poem…

It’s often forgotten that being memorized is the best way to be remembered. For centuries, British schoolchildren had to learn to recite the first 20 lines of Geoffrey Chaucer’s general prologue from the “Canterbury Tales.” Then that got thrown out. Now, Chaucer has, for most people, joined that long list of vague names inhabiting a…

Approximately 67 years before the end of the American Civil War, George Moses Horton was born. He grew up a slave to the Horton family in North Carolina. While working the tobacco plantation, his mind freely traversed the world of verse and rhyme. Using old hymnals, he taught himself to read, while also learning the…

Drive south down I-95 in the new year, and you’ll join a fleet of cars with license plates from New York, Massachusetts, and Canada. These are the “snow birds,” off to exchange winter’s snow and frigid temperatures for the sunshine and balmy breezes of Miami and Key West. Drive north during this same season, and…

I never saw a Purple Cow, I never hope to see one, But I can tell you, anyhow, I’d rather see than be one! In 1895, American writer and humorist Frank Gelett Burgess penned those lines, which became one of the most famous American nonsense rhymes. Frank Burgess, circa 1910. Selections from the Bancroft Library…

It was in an Epoch Times newsroom in July 2012, where my fellow reporter Joshua Philipp and I lamented the state of poetry today. We both had literary backgrounds and had separately come to the very same conclusion: Really good poetry just didn’t have a place to call home anymore. By “really good poetry,” I…