Find poetry in unexpected places during O, Miami festival

Is it possible to get all 2.5 million Miami-Dade County residents to encounter a poem in just 30 days? O, Miami is back, and through its 35 events and 25 projects during April, it will certainly try.

The O, Miami Poetry Festival is a month-long effort to help every single person in Miami-Dade encounter a poem.

With the support of the Knight Foundation, here are a few ways that the community can stumble upon a poem this month:

▪ Metrorail Easy Tickets: Every single-rider Metrorail Easy Ticket purchased in April will have a poem in three languages (while supplies last).

▪ Buses: O, Miami wrapped a Miami-Dade Transit bus with 11 short poems written by Miami third- and fourth-graders

▪ Doggy refuse bags: “Poo-etry” is a partnership with Miami-Dade Parks to put a poem on the free dog poo bags distributed in select public parks.

▪ Snapchat: O, Miami has appointed a “Snapchat poetry curator” to crowd-source poems using the popular and ephemeral social-media platform.

▪ Gas pumps: Visit Tom Thumb gas stations from Monroe to Palm Beach counties for poems on the nozzle handles.

▪ WLRN: O, Miami partners with South Florida’s NPR station to collect short odes to food.

▪ Google’s Search Bar: Artist Julia Weist takes the short poems of South Florida inmates and inserts them into Google search. Just search the term “Miami inmate” during April.

▪ Supermarket checkout lanes: Poems by Miami students usher your groceries down to the cashier. Bored in line? Look down and read.

▪ Hotel door handle signs: The typical “Privacy Please” door handle signs in Miami Beach hotels have been replaced with poetic versions written by Miami poets.

For more information, visit omiami.org

This story was originally published April 3, 2017 at 4:49 PM with the headline "Find poetry in unexpected places during O, Miami festival."