Indianapolis International Airport (IND) hosted a Poetry Day this week with poetry readings and live music in honor of National Poetry Month.
But there’s poetry at IND year-round.
A video exhibit on Concourse A features a selection of poems by Mari Evans, one of the founders of the Black Arts Movement.
A poem by Mari Evans is one of the six poems featured in a series of 14 floor-to-ceiling glass panes in the concourses. The mural collection, The Indiana Windows, is the work of British artist Martin Donlin, who created the poetry-inclusive mural series using more than 2,000 hand-blown panes of glass.
Today we take a look back at some sweet photos from 50 years at Tampa International Airport (TPA). We get a look at some snaps from the new 14-gate concourse at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA). And we put some new items on our “Places To Go” list – as soon as we’re allowed.
TPA celebrates 50 years
Tampa International Airport’s Main Terminal complex turned 50 years old on April 15. As part of the celebration, the airport put together this sweet video with great vintage images.
Reagan National Airport debuts new concourse
There’s a new 14 gate, 225,000-square-foot concourse at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA).
Gates 46-59 will serve flights for American Airlines’ regional operations at DCA and give travelers amenity-filled waiting areas and direct, enclosed access to aircraft via jetbridges. This is a major upgrade from the previous set-up which involved shuttle buses out to the dreaded Gate 35X.
The new concourse has a panaramic views of the Washington, D.C. skyline, a variety of seating options with power plugs nearby, 14,000 square feet of concession space, four public restrooms, four moving walkways, two mother’s care rooms, an indoor pet relief area, and a new baggage handling system.
Here are some more photos shared by Reagan National Airport.
Places We’ll Go
Once we get the all-clear, we’re going to go. Everywhere.
Here are some places we’re putting on the list.
Celebrating James Brown in Augusta, GA
If soul legend James Brown was still with us, he’d turn 88 on May 3. His hometown of Augusta, GA will be the place to celebrate, with a citywide walking tour and an outdoor birthday block party.
Dollywood Flower & Food Festival
The Dollywood theme park in the Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee looks like fun. Especially if we could get there between April 23 and June 7 when more than half a million flowers will be blooming for the “Flower & Food Festival.”
Poetry in Miami
The O, Miami Poetry Festival is underway through the month of April, with the goal of having people encounter, enjoy, and engage with poems in unlikely places. One of the projects, Poetry About Town, consists of “call-up” poems about two streets in Miami Dade County.
If you’re flying to or from Miami International Airport anytime soon, there’s a new reason to book a window seat on the plane.
Each year during April, National Poetry Month, the annual O, Miami poetry festival tries to fulfill its mission of having everyone in Miami-Dade County encounter a poem at least once during the month.
In the past, program participants have put lines of poetry on bandannas worn by dogs and painted poems inside urinals.
One of this year’s projects is called “Poems To The Sky” – a project by Randy Burman, who last year put poems on the wrappers of popsicles that were handed out for free.
This year Burman is painting poems by local students in letters 40 feet high onto the roof tops of two buildings that sit in the flight paths of planes landing and taking off at Miami International Airport.
“The unknowing window seat occupant who just happens to look out the window as they are taking off to the east or landing from the west is the winner,” said Burman via email. “Having people discovering a poem in a place they never expected it is the ideal.”
Here’s the poem by 3rd grader Nieema Marshall that passengers will see:
I am
from
a place
where
it does
not snow
And here’s the roof poem by 4th grader Tywon Williams:
When I look
at a cloud
I feel like
I am one
Poem painting is underway – the pictures here are mock-ups of the finished product – and the goal is have both poems finished by the end of the month, with no plans yet for when the poems might be removed.
