EXTRA! COMING SOON ON SUBSTACK: "THE POETRY ZOO" by SAM STAGGS
IT'S FREE TO ALL READERS
WHAT ON EARTH IS THE POETRY ZOO?
Does the word “poetry” scare you, make you want to run? If so, you can relax as you stroll through this virtual menagerie. The poems are friendly, undemanding, and their subjects are well behaved, approachable, they won’t growl, bite, or make a mess. Even the rain forest animals might win your heart.
I assume that many of you, subscribers to Did You Sleep With the Models?, are also animal lovers, whether actual or potential. In either case, I invite you to The Poetry Zoo, which premieres on Substack Friday, June 6. Every Friday after that, for at least a year, there will be an animal poem.
It’s entirely free, and this is not the poetry that perhaps bored you in school as the teacher dived into a middling poem in search of symbols, or droned on about iambic pentameter. No, no, none of that here. The Poetry Zoo is designed to entertain. I hope you’ll find it engaging, even fun, something new that you might want to continue. I’ve made it easy by explaining obscure allusions and by defining unusual words, so you won’t have to google anything at all.
I have taken the liberty of adding all subscribers to Did You Sleep With the Models? to this new Substack post. No obligation, of course, but I hope you’ll stick around. (Note: If you joined Did You Sleep With the Models? after April 1 of this year, your email is not on The Poetry Zoo list. That’s because my IT man added this subscriber list to the new Substack on that date. You can join after June 6 at thepoetryzoo.substack.com, or send me an email and I’ll add you to the list.)
In making selections, I’ve tried to avoid the obscure, as well as those poems that turn up endlessly in textbooks and anthologies. Many poems in The Poetry Zoo are by living poets, others from the twentieth century, and a few from earlier times. I have found, however, that modern poets have closer connections with animals, more intimate and emotional, than earlier poets had.
What else? Eventually you’ll come across song lyrics…nonsense verse…haiku…translations, my own and those of others. Along with photographs and illustrations.
