April is National Poetry Month and this year, the Friends of the Farmville/Prince Edward Community Library and Longwood’s Greenwood Library are joining with the Farmville Downtown Partnership to celebrate the 2018 Poem in Your Pocket Day which is Thursday, April 26th. Initiated in April 2002 by the Office of the Mayor in New York City, in partnership with the city’s Departments of Cultural Affairs and Education. In 2008, the Academy of American Poets took the initiative to all fifty United States, encouraging individuals around the country to participate. In 2016, the League of Canadian Poets extended Poem in Your Pocket Day to Canada.

The collaboration of the Friends and Greenwood Library includes the selection of poems with the following themes: Love, Nature, the Seasons, and Children’s Poems. Once printed, the poems will be rolled and tied with ribbons for handing out on the Longwood Campus, at the Farmville Library, and downtown Farmville. A Friends volunteer will also hand out poems to residents at The Woodland. In coordination with local retailers and the Farmville Downtown Partnership, Friends volunteers will hand out poems to pedestrians and shoppers in downtown Farmville from 10am to 2pm. Retailers who choose to participate can also hand out poems to their customers in celebration of the day.

This year marks the second time that Farmville will celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day. In 2016, the Farmville branch of the Central Virginia Regional Library joined Longwood’s Greenwood Library to celebrate the coming of Spring and National Poetry Month, handing out poems to students, faculty and staff at Longwood; Farmville Library patrons; and shoppers in downtown Farmville.