Sometimes poems are titled POEM. Some poets have a habit of naming their poems poem. Frank O’Hara has a ton of them. Jim Carroll, James Schuyler, Delmore Schwartz, and William Carlos Williams used the title often, too.

Why?

What does it imply to call your poem simply POEM? How does it influence your reading of a poem when all you’re given going into it is that one word? Why do these poems tend to be short? What are these poets trying to tell us, or not tell us?

That title seems at once a way of drawing attention to itself and of burying itself—for how will it be found later, among all the more uniquely titled poems?

And how, once you’ve read the poem, does that title affect your reading of its tone?

I’ve made a mini-anthology of poems called poem. To contribute your own, log onto our forum.

Poem

BY FRANK STANFORD

When the rain hits the snake in the head,

he closes his eyes and wishes he were

asleep in a tire on the side of the road,

so young boys could roll him over, forever.

Poem

BY THOMAS MCGRATH

How could I have come so far?

(And always on such dark trails?)

I must have traveled by the light

Shining from the faces of all those I have loved.

Poem

BY FRANK O’HARA

The eager note on my door said “Call me,

call when you get in!” so I quickly threw

a few tangerines into my overnight bag,

straightened my eyelids and shoulders, and

headed straight for the door. It was autumn

by the time I got around the corner, oh all

unwilling to be either pertinent or bemused, but

the leaves were brighter than grass on the sidewalk!

Funny, I thought, that the lights are on this late

and the hall door open; still up at this hour, a

champion jai-alai player like himself? Oh fie!

for shame! What a host, so zealous! And he was

there in the hall, flat on a sheet of blood that

ran down the stairs. I did appreciate it. There are few

hosts who so thoroughly prepare to greet a guest

only casually invited, and that several months ago.

Poem

BY JILL ALEXANDER ESSBAUM

A clementine

Of inclement climate

Grows tart.

A crocus

Too stoic to open,

Won’t.

Like an oyster

That cloisters a spoil of pearls,

Untouched—

The heart that’s had

Enough

Stays shut.

Poem

BY MATTHEW ROHRER

You called, you’re on the train, on Sunday,

I have just taken a shower and await

you. Clouds are slipping in off the ocean,

but the room is gently lit by the green

shirt you gave me. I have been practicing

a new way to say hello and it is fantastic.

You were so sad: goodbye. I was so sad.

All the shops were closed but the sky

was high and blue. I tried to walk it off

but I must have walked in the wrong direction.

Poem

BY JAMES TATE

The angel kissed my alphabet,

it tingled like a cobweb in starlight.

A few letters detached themselves

and drifted in shadows, a loneliness

they carry like infinitesimal coffins

on their heads.

She kisses my alphabet

and a door opens: blackbirds roosting

on far ridges. A windowpeeper

under an umbrella watches

a funeral service. Blinkered horses

drum the cobblestones.

She kisses: Plunderers gather

in a lackluster ballroom

to display their booty. Mice

testify against one another

in dank rodent courtrooms.

The angel kisses my alphabet,

she squeezes and bites,

and the last lights flutter,

and the violins are demented.

Moisture spreads across my pillow,

a chunk of quartz thirsts

to abandon my brain trust.

Poem

BY WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS

As the cat

climbed over

the top of

the jamcloset

first the right

forefoot

carefully

then the hind

stepped down

into the pit of

the empty

flowerpot