Poetry, Prizes, and a Vanishing Tooth

Plus, April poetry prompts to spark your own writing!

I'm thrilled to share that two never-before-seen poems of mine, "Root Resorption" and "Goodbye Has a Sound," are featured in The Central Avenue Poetry Prize 2025 anthology! This collection came out on April 1 and brings together an incredible group of voices. I’m honored to have my work alongside so many talented poets. A huge thank you to Central Avenue Publishing for this opportunity and for continuing to uplift poetry.

Special thanks also go to my dentist—who, over one year ago, had the unfortunate task of telling me that I have internal root resorption on my #11 (for the non-dentally inclined, that means my tooth is slowly disappearing from the inside out, sometimes for no apparent reason). Not the best news, but hey, at least it inspired a poem that was shortlisted for a prize and published in this book! Proof that poetry can come from literally anything—even an existential dental crisis. (For now, the tooth is still in my mouth, so… so far, so good…)

This is a great collection to purchase if you want to get to know more poets.

In Poetry,

Alicia

One more thing!

Poetry prompts for April have dropped from some of my fave poets:

• Jen Rogue
  and
  Kat Savage
  announced their annual joint prompts

• Amy Kay is sharing a poem prompt a day…

• …So is Caitlin Conlon

• Michelle Awad has shared a whole month’s worth

• Raquel Franco shared 15 prompts

• Andrea Freeman has shared 22 prompts

Poetry prompts are creative starting points designed to inspire new writing. They can be a single word, a phrase, a visual cue, or even a structured challenge—like writing a poem in a specific form or from a particular perspective. Some poems I’ve created, inspired by prompts, even end up in my books!

Okay. Bye.