“Carry me when you go forth over land and sea,” Whitman says to the reader in “Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in Hand.” Indeed, for readers and writers, there are always lines that we carry with us—poems that we go to when we need them, that we share with others, hoping that those lines can provide comfort, laughter, joy, or understanding.
Poem in Your Pocket Day, which was initiated in 2002 and launched nationally in 2008, encourages people to share what poems they carry with them—literally, the poem they’ve chosen to print out and carry in their pocket throughout the day. This year, we’ve teamed up with the League of Canadian Poets to expand the celebration across North America. Check out our new, downloadable Poem in Your Pocket Day PDF to find ideas for celebrating the day, as well as poems by classic and contemporary American and Canadian poets such as Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost, Louise Glück, Juan Felipe Herrera, M. Travis Lane, Alice Major, W. S. Merwin, W. B. Yeats, and more. Find out more on our Poem in Your Pocket Day page and share what poem you’ve chosen to carry with you “over land and sea” or wherever you may go today by sharing on social media with the hashtag #pocketpoem.