July 2003 Archives

Came across this today Science Blog - Fetus heart races when mom reads poetry. Though the title suggests a link between poetry and the fetus, the article itself never mentions that the mother is reading poetry to the unborn child. The mother is just reading.

It would be interesting to see if the fetus would react differently if the mother were reading a poem or, say, a passage from a history or science book.

I just looked at Poetry Magazine and sadly note the web site is of little help to those of us who publsh poetry online. Poetry's presence is limited to Featured Poets from each monthly issue. It's nice to have those poems available, but I wonder if they generate much online sales of the dead-tree mag.

The irony is that there's also the web site PoetryMagazine.com, which looks like a collection of members who pay for web pages, like an online vanity press. I'm afraid people who go there with the intent of seeing the older Poetry Magazine will come away with an ill informed impression of contemporary poetry.

In any case, Poetry Magazine, the 1912 version, should do more to publicize the online journals that are doing the serious work of bringing quality poems to the space of the screen.