(Yes, I just linked you to the Wikipedia article)
The AAP is basically your one-stop shop for all things poetry. Their aim is "to support American poets at all stages of their careers and to foster the appreciation of contemporary poetry." They have a number of prestigious awards that they give out annually. Their website is a treasure trove of information on every American poet, with selected works as well as audio of their poems that you can listen to for free. You can find some pretty fun things on their site - resources for teaching poetry, there's a poetry calendar of events going on throughout the US, you can even find poetic "landmarks" like the homes or grave sites of your favorite poets of yesteryear.
One of my favorite things about the Academy is their "Poem-A-Day" program. Every weekday morning, I'll get an email from the Academy with a new poem from a contemporary American poet, usually one that I've never heard of before. On weekend mornings, the Academy sends out famous poems by some of the world's most renowned poets.
I think Friday might be included as part of the weekend because today's poem was Shakespeare's Sonnet #30. Who knows how many times I've read that one. Tens of hundreds of thousands maybe, give or take. But I'm not complaining. Actually, there probably isn't a more perfect poem to match my current, almost perpetual, state of mind than this sonnet.
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought,
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste:
When the world is quiet, and you have a moment alone in your own head, your mind sometimes wanders to an earlier time. For some reason, you start to remember the negatives of your past, and the old wounds open up again and feel new.
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow,
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long since cancelled woe,
And moan the expense of many a vanished sight:
Tears fall for all of the mistakes, the goodbyes, the losses, the untimely actions, the spoken and unspoken words. . .
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone,
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoanèd moan,
Which I new pay as if not paid before.
It's easy to get caught up in a cycle of regret, to feel like your failures will continue to follow you where ever you go. You might think that you'll have to continue to atone for your sins for the rest of your life. Nothing you do, no matter how much you improve, no matter how much you've realized since, will change the past. How, then, can you move on?
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend,
All losses are restored and sorrows end.
I think about a friend of mine, and about how much our friendship means to me. I think about how much my friend is always such a joy, and how seeing my friend brightens my day. Even just thinking about my friend lifts my spirits. The mistakes and failures and losses are still there, but at least for that moment they aren't weighing me down. Sorrow, for the moment, has ended. I think about my friend and all of a sudden, life doesn't seem so bad.
- Viscountess, '12-13
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