April is Poetry Month! Ironically enough, it is also Mathematics Awareness month and while I gravitate towards poetry I flee from mathematics. If I landed in Norton Juster’s “The Phantom Tollbooth,” I would undoubtedly side with the denizens of Dictionopolis and not the inhabitants of Digitopolis. I am probably not being fair, since poetry celebrates math in its rhythm and meter, but for me, anyways, April is Poetry Month.

Like many libraries around the world, we are using a “Poem in Your Pocket” theme to generate interest for poetry of all types. In the junior library, the bulletin board posts a challenge to young readers… read the “Pocket Poem” and find the book that contains the poem and indicate the page number. All entries will be put into a drawing at the end of the month for a prizes. (I usually give away books.)

The beautiful pockets were made by our head librarian who is an accomplished seamstress. We selected some of the poems to match the material pattern of the pockets. The pattern that included buses and crossroads and maps ended up holding Robert Frost’s “Road Less Traveled” in the junior library and “Travel” by Edna St. Vincent Millay in the high school library. A pocket whose patterns is populated with owls holds “The Owl and the Pussycat” and Joyce Sidman’s “Dark Emperor.”

We have collected poem suggestions and even original poems from school staff members. All library patrons are encouraged to “pick a pocket” and take one of the many poems home with them.

As patrons pocket our poems, we will add new ones. Here in Tokyo, as the sakura petals pile in drifts on the ground, it does seem very appropriate for April to be Poetry Month.

It’s hard not to stop and stare at the spectacle of falling pink snow. Perhaps that is why April is also officially “Distracted Driving Awareness Month.”