By Bacopa Literary Review 2025 Formal Poetry Editor Susan Ward Mickelberry
As 2025 Formal Poetry Editor for Bacopa I anticipate and welcome a variety of poetic forms, and there are many. Writer’s Digest, for instance, offers the wonderful “List of 168 Poetic Forms for Poets.” We all have favorites, and I tend to like Japanese forms such as haiku, tanka, and haibun. And who knew there was such a thing as a haiku sonnet? Some poets enjoy working with the traditional Elizabethan sonnet, the Italian sonnet, or the French chanso. Some may enjoy the flexibility of a cascade poem. Other popular poetry styles include the pantoum, villanelle, and golden shovel. And on and on, within this particular list up to 168. What a grand variety of choices to play with.
I am looking forward with delight to reading all poems that arrive in my category. I appreciate and am engaged by poems that are introspective, as well as poems that expand one’s vision with a unique way of viewing the world. I enjoy being surprised by a poem that evokes an imaginative experience. I especially appreciate poems that draw on a contrast between nature and the human experience, that can be deeply personal, but also touch a universal aspect in us all. Whether humorous or overwhelmingly sad.
When it comes to specifics, I’ll be looking for meticulous, surprising use of form, imagery, and details. Mood and emotion, or their contrasts, a knowing voice and spare details can be powerful.
Finally, I will pay attention to clever, cogent use of form, including meter, rhyme, flow, and voice, as demanded by the poem itself.
Poets might ask themselves, will my poem make the reader cry, laugh, agree, learn? Is it fresh and honest? Is it spiced with narrative tension? Will it beg to be read again?
Poetry Co-Editor Susan Ward Mickelberry is a writer, editor, poet, and long-time yoga teacher. Her poetry collection And Blackberries Grew Wild was published by Roadside Press in 2024. She is a 2024 Pushcart nominee. Poems appear in many publications including This is Poetry: Volume IV: Poets of the South. She participates in regional poetry readings and events, most recently at the Lynx Bookstore and at Civic Media Center’s Poetry Jam.
