Submissions

A Poetry Feed would love to receive and post recordings of you reading poems you appreciate.  Here’s what to do:

What to Record

A Poetry Feed is a venue for sharing aloud a wide variety of poems, so please feel free to read and record any published poem you appreciate.

If you are a published poet, you are welcome to submit recordings of your own work.  If you do, please accompany them with at least one recording of you reading the work of another poet, too.  Also, since the Feed is not a traditional poetry magazine, I’m not interested in selecting new, unpublished work for publication, except by invitation.

There is no limit to the number of recordings you may submit though there may be a limit to the number I’ll post.

How to Record

I use a simple headset microphone, like this one, plugged into my laptop, and I record using Audacity, a free sound recording/editing program.  If your computer isn’t already equipped with sound recording software, you can learn more about Audacity here and download Audacity here.

Please record, encode, and save your recording as an mp3 file. (To create an mp3 in Audacity, you must also download a separate mp3 encoder.  Click here for instructions, and here to download the encoder file.  You will only need to do this once.)

How to Read

Before recording, I almost always read a poem aloud to myself a few times to get a feel for the sentences, lines, and meaning in it. You may wish to do this, too.

Then, when you’re ready to read, quiet the space around you, hit “Record,” and read clearly and with expression.  For most of us, this means a little more slowly and with a little more range than feels natural.  The Feed’s not perfect nor trying to be, so don’t sweat the human variations in your voice or even the occasional stumbling in your reading.

Please begin your reading by mentioning the title and author of the poem.  End your reading with a mention of the source of the poem and a line like, “This is [your name] reading for apoetryfeed.org.”

How to Submit Your Recording

Simply email the Feed at apoetryfeed@gmail.com with your recording included as an attachment.  In the text of your email, please include these details:  Your name, the title and author of the recorded poem, and its published source.  If you’d like to add a personal note about the poem (or anything else) of course you may do that!

I look forward to hearing from you, and I’ll let you know within a few days of your email whether/when I’ll serve it up in the Feed.

Cheers,

Karsten