Read A Little Poetry has evolved over almost two decades as a community of poetry lovers, readers, writers, educators, among others, whom I found are aligned with my vision for what I want to accomplish in this little corner of the world:

• Hold poets to the light and promote their work and their books
• Share moving poems that become our anchors through time, through the gamut of delight and sorrow, and everything else in between
• Nourish the inner life and imagination of anyone looking to get started on reading and/or writing poetry
• Pursue a deeper exploration of poetry, writing, literature, creativity, loving, and living
• Discover more work by poets who come from both large or small presses

My poetry education as a young writer consisted of reading works from old, white, cisgender, heterosexual men and women. It was what was available to me at the time, apart from the literature in my country. Hence, I am devoting my efforts to reading more works from women, LGBTQ+ and people of colour, and most importantly, living poets.

I seek to expand my reach however best I can, highlighting poets that come not just from the U.S. but also all over the world. Nevertheless, this site is primarily offered in the English language, so that it will remain accessible to readers wherever they reside.

While Read A Little Poetry has been instrumental to many teachers in planning their syllabus, it is not affiliated with any academic or literary institution. Because the poems I share are my personal choices, I am able to sustain this project independent of any outside influence, and I intend to keep this format for as long as possible.

Ultimately, there is no entity behind this site other than myself, and it will always remain free to all.

Read A Little Poetry operates as a personal curation project rather than a literary magazine or publication. I do not accept submissions, solicit work, or operate as a traditional publishing platform. Every poem shared here reflects my own reading journey and personal discoveries—works I’ve encountered in books, libraries, journals, and online that have moved me enough to share.

This site generates no revenue and is sustained entirely through my own resources and the occasional generous donations from readers, which go directly toward maintaining the website. I am not affiliated with publishers, literary organisations, or commercial entities, and I make no profit from sharing these works.

The poems I feature are selected through my own reading and research, not through submission processes. If you’re a poet seeking publication opportunities, I encourage you to explore literary magazines and journals that actively accept submissions. My role here is simply that of an enthusiastic reader sharing discoveries with fellow poetry lovers.

To provide sources for the text wherever possible is a continuing endeavour. The poems posted in the past are from books in my personal collection, or jotted in notebooks, journals, scraps of paper years back when I was still studying and borrowing copies from friends or the school library. I am currently working through old posts to make sure that everything is properly credited—if not the book where the poem was published, then a link to a literary journal or magazine, or other sites.

My mission is to make this place a useful resource for everyone, hence I am in the process of building the following:

• A comprehensive index of tags and topics
• A list of all poets and their work
• And other future features

I’ve always turned to Read A Little Poetry in times of incredible anguish or unbridled hope. You have witnessed me grow up, grow older, get lost, and find myself over and over since I was nineteen years old. I said then that this was an attempt to discover pieces of my life tucked away in poems, waiting to meet me again. I think I have lived through worlds, a hundred of them, narrated by poets who knew exactly what I was feeling and going through. This remains true.

Everything written here are my days blurring into one another. I wrote things for myself, but maybe I wrote it for you, too.

Yes, dear stranger: I am in love with poetry—have been for all these years. Poems have saved me in one way or another, and I hope the same for you.

As always, everything here is a work in progress.

Yours,
T.

T. De Los Reyes is the author of the chapbooks And Yet Held (Bull City Press) and Woeman (Hawai’i Review). Her poems have previously appeared or are forthcoming in Voice & Verse, ANMLY, RHINO, Narrative, Hunger Mountain, Birdcoat Quarterly, Crazyhorse, Hobart After Dark, and Pleiades, among others.

Her work is in conversation with womanhood, eros, and mapping the body—exploring geography vis-a-vis the question of identity as a person of colour. Past recognitions include: Notable Manuscript for the 2016 BOAAT Chapbook Prize, First Place in Filipino Poetry in the 2007 Maningning Miclat Poetry Awards, and Fellow for Filipino Poetry in the 2005 Ateneo Institute of Literary Arts and Practices, National Writers Workshop.

She launched a Substack newsletter called Poet’s Field Notes, in which she shares poetry, personal reflections, insights into her writing process, and more varied themes.

She is the designer of Nowruz Journal, a finalist for the 2022 CLMP Firecracker Award in Magazines/Best Debut, and runs Possibilities Studio, advising and working with writers and artists, as well as creative entrepreneurs and small businesses. She is also a community teaching assistant for ModPo (Modern and Contemporary American Poetry), offered by the University of Pennsylvania as a massive open online course for the past ten years.

She lives and writes in Manila, Philippines.

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