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    • 'Canzone to the Virgin' by Petrarch, Translated by Margaret Coats

      The Society
      June 10, 2022
      Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Translation
      21 Comments
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    • ‘Not All Angels Play the Harp’: A Poem by Roy E. Peterson

      The Society
      July 18, 2025
    • ‘Living Dead’: A Poem by James A. Tweedie

      The Society
      July 18, 2025
      3
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      The Society
      July 17, 2025
      5
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      The Society
      July 16, 2025
      3
    • ‘Unspoken Moments’: A Poem by Michael Pendragon

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      July 16, 2025
      8
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      The Society
      July 15, 2025
      14
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      The Society
      September 1, 2019
      High School Submissions, Poetry, Poetry Contests
      9 Comments
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      The Society
      June 21, 2025
      184
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      May 13, 2025
      1
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      March 31, 2025
    • The Best Poems of 2024: Winners of SCP International Poetry Competition

      The Society
      February 1, 2025
      28
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      February 1, 2025
      2
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      September 29, 2024
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  • ‘Not All Angels Play the Harp’: A Poem by Roy E. Peterson

    The Society
    July 18, 2025
    Culture, Poetry
  • ‘Living Dead’: A Poem by James A. Tweedie

    The Society
    July 18, 2025
    Blank Verse, Culture, Poetry
    3 Comments
  • ‘Martha’: A Poem by Scharlie Meeuws

    The Society
    July 17, 2025
    Beauty, Culture, Poetry
    5 Comments
  • ‘The Harvest’: A Poem by Peter Venable

    The Society
    July 16, 2025
    Beauty, Poetry
    3 Comments
  • ‘Unspoken Moments’: A Poem by Michael Pendragon

    The Society
    July 16, 2025
    Beauty, Poetry
    8 Comments
  • ‘The Hokey-Cokey—Chaucer Style’: A Poem by Paul A. Freeman

    The Society
    July 15, 2025
    Chaucer, Culture, Poetry
    14 Comments
  • ‘Poetic Influences’: A Poem by Margaret Brinton

    The Society
    July 15, 2025
    Beauty, Poetry
    8 Comments
  • ‘Of a Feather’ and Other Poems by C.B. Anderson

    The Society
    July 14, 2025
    Culture, Humor, Poetry
    7 Comments
  • ‘Vesper’ and Other Poetry by Martin Briggs

    The Society
    July 14, 2025
    Beauty, Poetry
    16 Comments
  • ‘Lasting Karma’: A Poem by Thomas Beckman

    The Society
    July 13, 2025
    Beauty, Culture, Poetry
    4 Comments
  • ‘Three Philosophical Quatrains’ by Ian Allaby

    The Society
    July 13, 2025
    Culture, Humor, Poetry
    4 Comments
  • ‘Poetry as a Pathway to Critical Thinking’: An Essay by Leland James

    The Society
    July 12, 2025
    Education, Essays, Poetry
    4 Comments

‘The Migrant Caravan’ by Lud Wes Caribee

The Society
October 22, 2018
Culture, Poetry
12 Comments
(poetry by Bruce Dale Wise) The Viacruces del Migrante, migrant caravan, which started out two hundred strong has grown to thousands, and keeps on...

‘Birthday Greetings’ and Other Poetry by David Hollywood

The Society
October 22, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
20 Comments
Birthday Greetings As themes show signs of nature's stay, And time’s propitious dates hold sway, The evidence augurs your bloom, From...

Two Sonnets by Andrew Barker

The Society
October 21, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
33 Comments
Sonnet 201. The Force that Through the Green Fuse Pulls the Poem. Written in the Dylan Thomas Museum, Swansea. July 2017 Oh to be the Poet! Love...

‘No Luck’ by Martin King

The Society
October 19, 2018
Humor, Poetry
17 Comments
  Why is it when you’re down and out, you’re also out of luck? Success they say is easy, “you’ll find it in a book.” I waded...

‘Solid Ground’ and Other Poetry by Clinton Van Inman

The Society
October 18, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
27 Comments
Solid Ground Our greatest philosopher David Hume, Whose logical doubts leave naught to assume, Used skeptical arguments he had found To leave...

Review: Selected Poems from Baudelaire’s Les Fleurs du Mal, Translated by Helen Palma

The Society
October 17, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Essays, Poetry, Reviews
10 Comments
by Joseph Charles MacKenzie Read the Selected Poems from Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal online. Email [email protected] for details on...

‘The Two-way Wye’ by Mike Ruskovich

The Society
October 16, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
5 Comments
  I woke this day beside the two-way Wye, at peace with wars too often waged inside between the push of how, the pull of why. The...

‘United They Fall’ and Other Poetry by C.B. Anderson

The Society
October 15, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
34 Comments
United They Fall Exhausted armies cling to noble trees along the margin of a meadow mown two weeks ago.  It's fifty-five degrees, and summer's...

‘The Mellow Season’ by Carole Mertz

The Society
October 14, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
45 Comments
Ah, now comes the mellow season, Marks its time with jackdaws caws. Autumn with its rusty reason Offers forth its season’s laws. Now no more...
poem/macgregor/education

A Brief History of Riddles

The Society
October 13, 2018
Culture, Essays, Poetry, Riddles
7 Comments
by Manfred Dietrich The world is riddled with riddles. Riddling is as old and as ubiquitous as language itself. When God invited Adam to name the...

‘The Swallows of La Cienega’ by Joseph Charles MacKenzie (with Audio)

The Society
October 12, 2018
Beauty, Poetry, Readings
92 Comments
  For Elizabeth La Cienega slept on a muted afternoon At old Las Golodrinas, when I spied a nest Of swallows beneath the age-worn...

‘The Concert’ by Dr. Emory D. Jones

The Society
October 11, 2018
Poetry
7 Comments
  So delicate at first, the music swells And fills with brilliance of a dawning sun Each listener and cracks the callused shells The world...

Three Limericks by Nivedita Karthik

The Society
October 10, 2018
Children's, Humor, Limerick, Poetry
11 Comments
  An acrobat named Larry Loops was best among all circus troupes, But he quit one day and was heard to say, “My boss made me jump all...

‘Squandered Wealth’ by David Whippman

The Society
October 9, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
13 Comments
In his bedsitter years, he was alone And all his dreams were haunted by some girl More wonderful than any precious stone Who’d bring fulfilment...

‘Tweedie of Drumelzier’ by James A. Tweedie

The Society
October 8, 2018
Culture, Poetry
21 Comments
Dark Devil’s Pool, where Spirit of the Tweed __Conceived the first-born of the Tuede clan; __Each maiden fair, and muckle braw each man, __With...

‘So Says the Prof.’ by Steven Shaffer

The Society
October 7, 2018
Culture, Deconstructing Communism, Poetry
14 Comments
“Religion is an opiate of the masses,” So says the Prof. lecturing to his classes. “College used to be a carrier pigeon For this terrible...

The Eight Greatest Poems of William Wordsworth

The Society
October 6, 2018
Beauty, Best Poems, Culture, Essays, Poetry, The Environment
14 Comments
by Charles Eager William Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth, Cumberland, in 1770—the same year as gave us Beethoven, Hegel, and Hölderlin—and...

Two Translations from German by David Gosselin

The Society
October 5, 2018
Beauty, Poetry, Translation
7 Comments
Death Is the Cooling Night by Heinrich Heine Death is the cooling night, Life is the sultry day, But now darkness settles And I long for...

‘Gulag’ by Sam Gilliland

The Society
October 4, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Deconstructing Communism, Poetry
7 Comments
For John McCain, Ernest C. Brace, & Alexander Solzhenitsyn I season my pen with the sonnet's blood, And do not reason with a moonless...

‘On the Kavanaugh Hearings’ by Joe Tessitore

The Society
October 2, 2018
Culture, Poetry
17 Comments
I . The Accused: “Your Honor… And if I were a troubled lad and if indeed I did go bad, it matters not what I've done since? No point in...

‘To My Wife, Suzi Venus’ by Tod Benjamin

The Society
October 2, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
6 Comments
a Petrarchan sonnet Life’s hills have been trampled since first we met, That mad, magic moment long years ago, When your smile lit fires in the...

‘Decay of the Literary Sense’ by Joseph S. Salemi

The Society
October 1, 2018
Culture, Humor, Poetry
26 Comments
—from A Gallery of Ethopaths* For those of us who cherish text, There’s anguish in what I’ll say next. The world of letters, by...

‘The Autumn Daylight Sky’ by Joe Spring

The Society
September 30, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
10 Comments
  Pure of any mortal mote ___and boundless (but for sight): The deep dry sky of Autumn ___inscribes the shadows bright. (For what could...

‘‘Cause You’d Be Here’ by Gleb Zavlanov

The Society
September 29, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
11 Comments
  The butterfly, the sea anemone, And snowflake, though possessive of the true Design of grace and perfect symmetry, Seem crude and ugly...

‘The Coworker’ and Other Poetry by Jeffrey Essmann

The Society
September 28, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
11 Comments
The Coworker A “need-to-know” it’s called in Personnel and I’m just high enough to need to know she’s going through that quiet hell of...

‘After RFK’ and Other Poetry by Robert Piazza

The Society
September 27, 2018
Culture, Poetry
4 Comments
After RFK __I’m named for one about whom Lowell wrote That doom was woven in his veins. In June Of 1968, my father trained To blow-up bridges...

‘A Folded Note Beneath the Door’ by Shannon Rose Cummings

The Society
September 25, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
5 Comments
Painted, woody there it stands, this door behind which kingdom fans. Bright with order, calm with ease, a wooden plank with hidden seas. A...

Review: Two Poetry Books by James B. Nicola

The Society
September 24, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Essays, Humor, Poetry, Reviews
3 Comments
by James Sale Wind in the Cave, Finishing Line Press, 2017 Out of Nothing, Shanti Arts Publishing, 2018 Recently in a poetry review of another...

‘The Ballad of Mulan’: A Rhyming Translation

The Society
September 23, 2018
Culture, Poetry, Short Stories, Translation
27 Comments
Translation by Evan Mantyk "The Ballad of Mulan" was written in the sixth century about a legendary warrior, Hua Mulan, who lived during China’s...

‘The Country Club’ and Other Poetry by Alec Ream

The Society
September 22, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
9 Comments
. The Country Club To think about a country club Begun for whisky in a tub, Distilled from fields of golden corn In a town where I was born, For...

Two Humorous Poems by R.G. Kaimal

The Society
September 21, 2018
Humor, Poetry
4 Comments
Woman: Why choose the red dress, dear? Reply: To me it's really white, To you it should be clear, Mood sets a color right!   Boy: Are...

‘Check-Mate by a Pawn’ and Other Poetry by Amy Foreman

The Society
September 20, 2018
Beauty, Children's, Culture, Humor, Poetry
29 Comments
Check-Mate by a Pawn for my sons We parry, thrust: This game of wits, Where each pawn must Deflect your hits. My mounted knight Skips...

‘Sonnet for a Cosmetic Company’ and Other Poetry by Jan Darling

The Society
September 19, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Humor, Poetry
21 Comments
Sonnet for a Cosmetic Company Ah Youth! To whom each maiden plights her troth To coax and woo each winsome charm to stay ‘Tis difficult to match...
poem/bryant/valentine

Three Sonnets by J. Simon Harris

The Society
September 18, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
19 Comments
I. I’ve awed at the Atlantic’s bluest depths, and peered at the Pacific’s deepest blues; the warm blue summer waters of Key West, and cold...
poem/sale/love poems

‘Sponsalia’ by Michael Curtis

The Society
September 17, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
6 Comments
Lay your hand in mine dear, ___Lay your hand in mine; If you will lay your hand in mine We shall like eager, fruitful vines ___Intertwine: Then...

‘Ode to Immortality’ by William Krusch

The Society
September 16, 2018
Beauty, Poetry
11 Comments
Ye boundless vaults of heaven without an end, __Thy silvery fields of azure stars unfold Above the earth, and verdurous spruces bend __Toward the...

‘I Taught a Lesson to My Toes’ by David Watt

The Society
September 15, 2018
Beauty, Humor, Poetry
25 Comments
I Taught a Lesson to My Toes I taught a lesson to my toes, They’d overstepped the mark, Escaping time and time again From nylon prisons...

‘Cape Disappointment’ by James A. Tweedie

The Society
September 14, 2018
Beauty, Poetry, Rondeau
14 Comments
a rondeau Cape Disappointment, battered and distressed, Besieged, beset, by brute-force waves hard-pressed As broad and deep Columbia...
poem/winick/aging

‘Left to Write’ and Other Poetry by Joe Tessitore

The Society
September 13, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
24 Comments
Left to Write It isn't difficult to find __the works the masters left behind, and others too have written verse, __some for the better, some for...

‘A Wedding Sonnet’ by Evan Mantyk

The Society
September 12, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
. Written: March 27, 2022 A Wedding Sonnet To those true cultivators of Zhen Shen Ren,* There is no common form we cannot take: The vows of love...
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  1. James A. Tweedie on ‘Living Dead’: A Poem by James A. TweedieJuly 18, 2025

    Ty, Cynthia. The results of our recent SCP poll ranked blank verse at 50% approval rate which generated a spirited…

  2. Marguerite on ‘Living Dead’: A Poem by James A. TweedieJuly 18, 2025

    Thank you for this poem, which ties together nicely the living and the dead...and the living dead! We lived in…

  3. Cynthia L Erlandson on ‘Living Dead’: A Poem by James A. TweedieJuly 18, 2025

    Nice description of the poet wrapped as a mummy. And really creative comparison of Hollywood archives to "modern pyramids"! Somehow,…

  4. Cynthia L Erlandson on ‘The Harvest’: A Poem by Peter VenableJuly 18, 2025

    I love the metaphor, especially the roots rending the heart apart.

  5. Kevin Parker on The Society of Classical Poets 2025 Haiku CompetitionJuly 18, 2025

    Two hearts enfold each other: origami of love, union, fate, life.

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