Kimberly Hirsh

I’ve been looking for ways to read more books and talk to more people about them, so when the Book Riot piece, Will You Join The Sealey Challenge? came across my radar, it made sense to answer YES.

During the month of August, participants read a poetry chapbook or full-length collection a day for 31 days while sharing their reads on social media using the hashtag #TheSealeyChallenge, named after poet Nicole Sealey and coined by Dante Micheaux during its first year.

Here are several links where you can learn more about the challenge and find suggestions of what to read:

• Nicole Sealey: Why I Read a Poetry Book Every Day For a Month (Bookmarks)
• The Sealey Challenge: An Expansive Way of Reading Poetry (Lithub)
• 31 Poets Recommend 31 Poetry Books to Read Every Day in August (Electric Literature)
• Every Poem Is a Love Poem to Something: An Interview with Nicole Sealey (The Paris Review)
• On the value of reading poetry together—and apart—in the current moment. (Lithub)

I myself will be reading a combination of library ebooks selected from recommendations linked in the Book Riot piece, e-chaps from Sundress Publications, and whatever I’ve got lying around the house. So you can expect that in addition to modern new-to-me poets, there will be some children’s collections of e. e. cummings and Emily Dickinson, one day of Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, and maybe even a YA verse novel or two.

Let me know if you decide to join in!