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Poem-a-Day

The only daily poetry series publishing new work by today’s poets.

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Poem-a-day

We Be Ludere

The root-tune of our being being this nightsweltering in the boybunks.

 

Owl-absonant sensesurround of sweatshine and moonklieg insomnia both.

 

The mustangy (shin-shank) clash of us hopped-up spiral-eyed on sun-tea and the sugars.

 

« en garde your ownself you I could kill you again easy »

 

Unsweet unsmotherable systole-diastole (and back again) (and so forth)

 

of the instigator v. the aggravoked; unbridleable-arterial
 


brotherbeat

 

of kick-poke (and pester-choke and parry) play at play.

Copyright © 2025 by Atsuro Riley. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on August 28, 2025, by the Academy of American Poets.

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Atsuro Riley

Atsuro Riley
Photo credit: Sven Wiederholt
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About Poem-a-Day

Poem-a-Day is the original and only daily digital poetry series featuring over 250 new, previously unpublished poems by today’s talented poets each year. Randall Mann is the Guest Editor of August. Read or listen to a Q&A with Mann about his curatorial process, and learn more about the 2025 Guest Editors. Support Poem-a-Day.  

If you have any questions about Poem-a-Day, visit our Poem-a-Day FAQ.

Previous Poems

Title Author Date
they need some of us to die Donte Collins 06/10/2020
Give Your Daughters Difficult Names Assétou Xango 06/09/2020
Alt-Nature [Excerpt] Saretta Morgan 06/08/2020
Beauty That is Never Old James Weldon Johnson 06/07/2020
Benediction Georgia Douglas Johnson 06/06/2020
For One Dead Helen Dimos 06/05/2020
did-you-just-say-thang theory Tiana Reid 06/04/2020
All Souls Procession Brandon Shimoda 06/03/2020
I Was Called Back Samuel Ace 06/02/2020
Lines on Love’s (Loss*) Erica Hunt 06/01/2020

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