Beloit Poetry Journal

I read the journal called Beloit Poetry Journal which is partly online and definitely printed. Beloit Poetry Journal’s main goal is to expose talented hidden poets which they have done for 63 years now. I read a majority of the poems on the fall 2013 issue and noticed quite a few things. To begin, the first poem in the issue is very heavy, which I thought was interesting because how I would imagine a poem journal to be organized is starting with light, then moving to heavier poem, then back to light, and maybe a heavy on at the end. Then again, this was one of the first poem journals I read so I really didn’t know what to expect. The first poem in this issue is titled “Telemachus” by Ocean Vuong, and seemed to be about his father’s death and how he sees his life past this point, the structure of this poem was series of longer lines separated into twos. The next poem I read was a series of seven, six line poems entitles “Route 9,” “Joss,” “Batteries,” “Dug In,”  “Combat Base,” Museum Pieces,” “Quang Tri River,” all by the poet Fred Marchant. While I didn’t have much interest in Vuong’s work I really enjoyed these seven poems. While at first seemed like they varied in topic, in reality they were all related. I really found it comforting almost that they were written very similarly. The adjectives were all alike in some way where they all were very fluid with each other. Finally the last series of poems I read was by John A. Nieves, once again BPJ provided variety in the style and tone of the writing. This poem was medium length lines in triplets, and each poem has three.  BPJ provided very different poem types and being new to poetry I found it enjoyable because it was easy to tell which types of poems I was drawn to, which in the end helps me strengthen my own writing voice. I also really appreciated that all of these poems were written by aspiring poets. I enjoyed this journal a lot and it makes me very interested in the world of poem journals.