Every poet laureate has a project, and this is his: American Life in Poetry, a new column being offered to the nation's newspapers and beginning on this page today. Each week on this page, Kooser will introduce a short poem by a different poet and offer a paragraph or two of introduction. The project is being carried out in conjunction with the Poetry Foundation, the Library of Congress and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

The clout of the poet laureate title and his wife's newspaper connections got Kooser a spot on the agenda at a meeting of managing editors in Washington, D.C., in the fall, where he outlined the idea. The first column appeared five weeks ago; 55 newspapers signed up, with a combined circulation of 5.6 million people.

As an added feature, The Honolulu Advertiser will prepare a local version of the column on the last Sunday of each month, Poetry in Island Life — publishing a short, locally written poem that previously appeared in area literary magazines or in a poetry anthology or collection. (As with the national column, we are not accepting unsolicited manuscripts, and only previously published works will be used.)

In a phone conversation from his home in Garland, Neb., Kooser was pleased about the idea of a Hawai'i version of his column. "It's a really good thing to be doing, and I'm just glad we can take a little credit for being an impetus," he said. He is aware of the work of some Island-based poets —Êhe recently did a reading with Joy Harjo — and said he has been invited to speak here and hopes to do so.

Kooser, whose official term as poet laureate began in October 2004, and ends later this year, is known as a straightforward man who speaks as thoughtfully and simply as he writes and isn't ashamed to say that it's important to him that his poems be understandable. For 40 years, he worked as an insurance executive in Lincoln, Neb., rising each morning before dawn to get in his writing time. Occasionally, he'd take a poem into the office to read to his colleagues, and if they didn't understand it, he'd often rework it.

Poetry in various forms was a common feature of newspapers in the first half of the 20th century, Kooser said. He owns a copy of a collection of the best poetry from newspapers that appeared annually for a number of years, and it's not all rhyming fluff, he said. "There are really respectable poems, and often topical poems," he said, that reflect the concerns of the time or place.

He's heard a number of reasons why the tradition of newspaper poetry faltered: Journalists found it difficult and time-consuming to select from among the increasingly difficult (some would say obtuse) literary poetry of the late 20th century, while readers who lacked a literary education struggled to understand the work. The literati rejected more conventional poetic forms and a rift developed between the poetic world and the broader readership.

Kooser says his readings around the country have convinced him, however, that many readers have a hunger for poetry and that more people are writing poetry than you might think. "People have been so intimidated. They don't want to appear ignorant, but at the same time, they're baffled, and so they withdraw," said Kooser. "So many have come up to me over the years and said that they felt excluded from poetry and missed it."

He noted that after Sept, 11, 2001, there was an outpouring of poetry on the Internet. "My take on that is that poetry is a way of finding or establishing a little bit of order in very chaotic times. You had all this ash and smoke, and these enormous tragedies, and people began making tight little poems as their response to that."

His aim in the new column is to direct people to poems that are more transparent in approach, more manageable in length and yet still possessed of some weight and meaning.

"I'm not dumbing down poetry," he said. "But there are a lot of poems that have a kind of openness and generosity about them that welcomes readers."

Kooser said that like many readers, he finds it difficult to explain just what about a poem moves him or speaks to him. "I heard this story about Robert Frost, reading a poem at some event. Somebody asked him what he meant by it and he simply read it over again — which says a great deal about how poetry works, and that it can't really be talked about too well."

Learn more:

About American Life in Poetry: www.americanlifeinpoetry.org

About Ted Kooser: poetry.about.com/od/poets/p/kooser.htm

About the poet laureate: www.loc.gov/poetry/about_laureate.html

For a sampling of Kooser poems: www.poemhunter.com/ted-kooser/poet-10125