I love poetry; I have since I was very young. But when I think of the years leading up to my first publication (coming sometime this year - wahoo!), I always think of the short stories, essays, and unfinished novels I wrote. It hit me the other day that I've actually been writing poetry longer than I have books. I dug through my chest of old notebooks and found my first poetry journal. That journal has over 20 poems in it; all written before I reached middle school. I shouldn't have been surprised.
Poetry has always come naturally to me. Whenever I was bored I was writing poetry. Whenever I was sad, mad, frustrated, dejected, hopeless or furious, I was writing poetry.
So in honor of my love for poetry, here is my Top 20 Poems list. I am a fan of both slam and classic poetry, so I tried to include an equal blend of both. In the interest of fairness I didn't choose more than one poem from each poet (or else this whole article would have been dominated by Neil Hilborn and Langston Hughes). I highly suggest you check out more works by these poets though, since many of them have a number of fantastic pieces.
Each poem listed below also has three descriptive words that I feel encompass the feel of it. Everyone interprets poems differently though, so I encourage you to read/listen to these poems on your own and formulate your own opinion of them!
Poetry has always come naturally to me. Whenever I was bored I was writing poetry. Whenever I was sad, mad, frustrated, dejected, hopeless or furious, I was writing poetry.
So in honor of my love for poetry, here is my Top 20 Poems list. I am a fan of both slam and classic poetry, so I tried to include an equal blend of both. In the interest of fairness I didn't choose more than one poem from each poet (or else this whole article would have been dominated by Neil Hilborn and Langston Hughes). I highly suggest you check out more works by these poets though, since many of them have a number of fantastic pieces.
Each poem listed below also has three descriptive words that I feel encompass the feel of it. Everyone interprets poems differently though, so I encourage you to read/listen to these poems on your own and formulate your own opinion of them!