April is National Poetry Month. Even though writers and audiences can’t gather in person because of the coronavirus, verse is happening on Facebook or Zoom, in people’s notebooks and in our earbuds. Some highlights are a sound artist who is making an audio collage of haikus about the pandemic, weekly book release readings from Copper Canyon Press, and the option to book a live video call with a poet through the Poetry Society of New York.

Poetry was the first way I fell in love with words. Before journalism was even on my radar, I found comfort in the complexity of other people’s line breaks, and all the mysteries that such small amounts of text could contain.

Now, in a moment of international uncertainty, when we can’t plan for the future, or even visualize exactly how the world might change in the aftermath of the pandemic, groups are gathering across the country and around the world to celebrate stanzas and all the things that poetry can do in a time of crisis. Here’s how you — a poetry lover or someone brand-new to the art form — can tune in and take part.

Open Mics

Nuyorican Poets Cafe offers online open mics via Zoom on Monday nights.

Women Writers in Bloom Poetry Salon, a literary salon based in New York City and modeled after salons of the Harlem Renaissance (and founded by the poet and author JP Howard), is hosting an open mic over Zoom on April 18.