2023 NaPo Recap

^Word Cloud of 2023 NaPo Titles made on wordcloud.com

The NaPo Orchard was planted, cultivated, and poetry was grown! This has been an amazing National Poetry Month! And I'm here with the highlights!

This year we started brainstorming NaPo titles all the way back in September so by the time April came around, our poets were ready to write! This year people wrote about the familiar themes of love, seasons, growth, and the writing process - there were a few stand-out themes from this year too! There were several epistolary poems, seven authors writing about funerals, lots of reflections on mothers and traveling, and at least ten poems about chickens! Amidst it all we saw folks try out sonnets, cultivate new aesthetics, push to go outside their usual poetry-comfort-zone, and produce some truly amazing poems!

This year some new highlights were The Orchard a NaPo-Exclusive Newsletter with all the news, interviews, updates, and tips right in one place put together by @LadySpark and contributed to by the Poetry Crew. We also tried a new activity to recognize some of our favorite poems compiling a PCrew Pick Hall of Fame with 30 of our favorite poems from the month - we also encouraged users to shout out their own picks with the hashtag "#PeoplesPick" which many NaPo writers participated in. April Madness was ran by @weathervane this year with @Meshugenah @Hijinks, @Willard, @LizzyTyler, @Plume and @EsmerayaRose serving as judges. And we also had a series of mini-challenges and poetry jams along the way to encourage users to keep on writing.

A huge thank you to Poetry Crew for the wonderful work and planning that went into cultivating such a wonderful Poetry Celebration this April including hosting jams and contests, organizing, writing, cataloguing and encouraging. Thank you to Hijinks, Quillfeather, Spark, and Mesh for compiling the results this year. And thank you to every writer who participated in sharing your poetry or encouraging others. We had some truly wonderful encouragers this year in the thread - and I think that helped this to be one of the most terrific NaPo months ever. I hope every person who participated went away with some poetry they're proud of.

Our grand totals this year for participation - we had 55 participants (exact same number as last year!), 57 threads, and 956 poems were written with 13 poets completing "Poem A Day" - that is pretty amazing! This year @tatteredbones wrote the most poems with 54 poems between their two threads, and @alliyah wrote the most comments with 77 by the end of the month!

Here's some highlights and award winners (if you think you earned a badge, but did not receive one, please PM a Poetry Crew Member) - congratulations all around! And thank you to @Plume, @LadySpark, & @alliyah for designing the badges this year.

Writing Poems - Finding Fruit

First Sprouts (wrote 5+ poems! - watch that poetry bloom!)
@Buranko, @rida, @Stringbean, @ForeverYoung299, @Hkumar, @yosh, @Willard, @ChesTacos, @JustPerks, @Apricity, @Mageheart, @momonster, & @starshipgirl

Early Bloomer (wrote 15+ poems - enough poetry to share with a friend!)
@WeepingWisteria, @BeeTheWanderer, @Cadi, @EsmerayaRose, @WeatherVane, @Lovestrike, @Hijinks, @Plume, @DreamyAlice, @Ari11, @SilverNight, @KateHardy, @niteowl, & @Euphory

NaPo Complete Harvest (winners cultivated 30+ poems during the month of April - that's a lot of fruit!)
@Snoink, @winterwolf0100, @LadySpark, @Dossereana, @FireEyes, @TheSilverFox, @Liminality, @Elinor, @Meshugenah, @Figmoon, @LuxLuthor, @Rook, @Tatteredbones, @alliyah, @Spearmint, @Quillfeather, @TheBlueCat, & @Ventomology

Poem-A-Day Champion (wrote at least 1 poem every single day of the month - quite a discipline and achievement!)
@FireEyes, @TheSilverFox, @Liminality, @Dossereana, @Elinor, @Meshugenah, @LuxLuthor, @Rook, @Spearmint, @Quillfeather, @TheBlueCat, @Ventomology, & @winterwolf0100

Community - Tending Gardens

Garden Challenge (these users were community champions tending the NaPo gardens with sunshine and at least 20 comments!)
@alliyah, @momonster, @Euphory, @Spearmint, @LadySpark, & @Hijinks.

Starter Seeds (these users spread encouragement with at least 5 unique comments!)
@WeepingWisteria, @Liminality, @DreamyAlice, @Meshugenah, @Quillfeather, @niteowl, @TheBlueCat

Bushel of Apples (these users collected a whole bushel of encouragement with at least 5 comments in one thread)
@Euphory & @momonster

Jam Collector (these users are jam masters! They're always in poetry jams and were spotted at at least 5 jams this month!)
@alliyah, @LadySpark, @Meshugenah, @Hijinks, @Quillfeather, @Rook, & @tatteredbones

Contests - Best in Show

PCrewPick Recipient - these poets wrote some of our Poetry Crew's favorite poems this month! Check out the full list Here: PCrew Pick Hall of Fame.
Euphory, figmoon, Silvernight, FireEyes, Apricity, starshipgirl, Ventomology, TheSilverFox, rida, Lovestrike, Stringbean, TheBlueCat, winterwolf0100, Cadi, LuxLuthor, niteowl, momonster, Hkumar, Ari11, Rook, WeepingWisteria, Dossereana, Buranko, Elinor, EsmerayaRose, BeeTheWanderer, Quillfeather

ThePeoplesPick Recipient - here are poets that The Poetry People couldn't help but shout-out with the #PeoplesPick hashtag!
Hijinks, LadySpark, Quillfeather, TheSilverFox, Ari11, winterwofl0100, figmoon, WeepingWisteria, KateHardy, Stringbean, Niteowl, Rook, DreamyAlice, Meshugenah, FireEyes, Liminality, weathervane, Ventomology

April Madness Finalists -