2 NEW THINGYS: Singing and Getting Published

Howdy, Campers ~ and Happy Poetry Friday! 

(the link to PF, my poem, and the link to 

my upcoming free poetry class 

are at the end of this post).

TeachingAuthors' topic this round is "Something New for the New Year" and it's my turn. But there's so much happening these days...where can I begin?

Let's start with singing!

 image by Oberholster Venita aka Artsy Bee on Pixabay

For years, I've run two folk music clubs: The Santa Monica Folk Music Club and The Beach Cities Folk Club. So many songs are poetry...and so much poetry can be sung.

About a year ago, I approached the organizers of our local politial events, suggesting our rallies needed music. Singing together in the midst of struggle brings joy and a sense of community to marches and rallies.

I've been the "music wrangler" ever since. We named ourselves The Resisters. My favorite feedback we've gotten after a rally is: "I come to these rallies to hear the music!"

Then, in January of this year, in the midst of danger and horrific violence in Minnesota, a beautiful thing took seed. Watch Anderson Cooper's 3 min and 30 second video to witness its growth.

Singing Resisance now trains groups all over this country (called Pods) teaching us that singing is resistance.

There are 18 singers in our pod. The number of singers who are available for any one event varies widely--once there were only two--and that, surprisingly,
worked out just fine. Our pod meets at my house, and today eight singers showed up for our last rehearsal before the March 28th rally

I am filled with joy. Most of the songs we will be singing are short and easy to pick up. One of my favorite songs is longer but also easy to learn. It's called SINGING FOR OUR LIVES, written by Holly Near. Watch Holly lead her crazy-beautiful 4 minute song

Now, let's talk poetry!

I'm thrilled to announce that one of my poems has just been published in DEMOCRACY'S URGENT CALL ~ A Poetry Anthology by League of Women Voters Members

Here were the submission guidelines:

We invite original poems that reflect on the guiding principles of democracy—such as justice, equality, freedom, civic engagement, and the common good.​ Please avoid references to specific elected officials or political parties, as we are committed to maintaining a nonpartisan focus.

We welcome a wide range of voices, styles, and perspectives. ​Surprise us with something fresh—insightful, musical, memorable. We’re looking for poems that move us: make us laugh, cry, reflect, or ​see the world in a new way. Both free verse and traditional forms are encouraged.

Please submit one unpublished, original poem of no more than 30 lines, ​including stanza breaks, formatted to fit on a single page using Times New Roman with 12 pt font. Submissions with special formatting, visual elements, or artwork cannot be considered.

A panel including a former Poet Laureate, a University of Wisconsin Professor of Poetry, and an experienced editor will review submissions and make final selections.

Chosen poems will reflect the League of Women Voters’ commitment to nonpartisanship as well as diversity, equity, and inclusion.

So! I plowed through the file of political poems I've written over the years...and also wrote some new ones.

Then I chose six of my favorite poems and sent them to my team: my husband, my sister Lyra, Teri, the president of our local League, a dear friend who is not on the same page with me politically, and my best friend Bruce (who is also a children's author and poet).

I asked them to rank the poems first to last.

In a minute I'll post the poem for you, but it might help to know that I live in California, and for years I've been part of a task force in our community to teach people earthquake safety.

So...drum roll, please: 

Here's the poem my team voted for, the poem which I submitted, and the poem which was accepted:

EARTHQUAKE
by April Halprin Wayland

She was ready.
On the shelves in her garage
were jugs of water,
cans of cat and dog food,
boxes of energy bars,
bandages, flashlights, batteries.
She was ready.
She stored sturdy shoes
beneath the bed
because in the aftermath,​
when you're running to help someone,
broken glass will slash your feet.

She was ready...
but not for this.
Not for tornadoes,
green-faced warlocks,
prison guards,
or flying monkeys.

Still, she was glad
for the sturdy shoes
beneath her bed.
There wasn't time
for bloody feet.
She was off to save the world.

poem © 2026 April Halprin Wayland

Thank you, Marcie, for hosting Poetry Friday this week!

.....................................................................................................................................

Oh--I almost forgot!

Come join my next 3-hour class on the first day of Poetry Month, April 1, 2026 through 

UCLA Extension's Writers' Program class, 

INTRO TO WRITING THE CHILDREN'S POETRY

~ A Workshop for Absolute Beginners

Enrollment ends soon...classes fill FAST. Why?

Because UCLA Extension offers 3-hour classes for FREE!

Do I still get nervous when my classes begin? You betcha.

But the moment I know my students and I are in that flow--that's the Great Gift.

many thanks to Barney Saltzberg for this illustration

Note: this is a basic workshop for absolute beginners.

Thank you for reading this post.

Now, it's your turn. What's something new this year?

Writers Groups--Now New and Improved by Mary Ann Rodman

 Continuing with our current topic "Something New for the New Year"....I have joined a new writer's group. Actually the group itself has been around awhile, it's just taken me this long to remember to reserve Thursday mornings to meet.

What's really new is that this is a Zoom group. The members are friends from the Vermont MFA program and live in Minnesota or Wisconsin. I live in Atlanta. 

Many years ago, before iPhones and texts and Zoom, I belonged to a metro Atlanta critique group. "Metro Atlanta" covers about 8 counties, and I live at the northern edge of the area. The rest of the group lived a couple counties to the east. The first Sunday night of the month, I would drive 100 miles, round trip, to group. Atlanta traffic is always terrible, especially Sunday nights when people are returning from out-of- town.

This did not stop me from meeting with the group known as WINGS. (This was so long ago, I no longer remember what WINGS stood for! ) They were terrific writers and critiquers, or I certainly wouldn't have made that long trek. These four ladies critiqued all but one of my published books. (My Best Friend sold just before I joined the group.) I could not have finished, let alone sold, any of them without their sharp insights and thoughtful questions. It was like having four editors, before sending my work to an actual editor. 

We were as diverse a group as you could find. What brought us together was a passion for children's literature and a desire to contribute to the genre. We were each others biggest fans and greatest critics. The Women of WINGS were the best.

But as they say, all good things must come to an end. Members retired or moved or developed health problems.  New members joined, but the group no longer was exclusively children's writers. There were writers whose work I was at a loss to critique (especially poetry). By then I was traveling to Mississippi once a month trying to look after my father, (which could be a whole book in itself.) 

I became a former member of WINGS.

Without a monthly meeting to spur me on, my creative output shrank. Long distance elder care and the seven hour drive to see Dad zapped my energy, creative and otherwise. Some years, this blog was all I wrote. Dad died, but I was still driving to Mississippi to settle his estate and clear out his semi-hoarded house. Then COVID hit. I was drained. (Weren't we all?) What's the point of writing I thought. It's not like I had an agent or editor panting for my work.  

I missed WINGS but there wasn't anything I could do about it. There wasn't another group around devoted solely to children's writing. (At least not any that wanted to new members.)

Then, I got an email from a friend from the Vermont writing program. She proposed that a bunch of us from the program and her local SCBWI meet weekly on Zoom. This would not be a critique group, but more of a support group. There would be a brief discussion of how we were doing and what we were working on. Then we would sign off for an hour, write, then check back in and talk about how it went. 

This was the kick in the pants I needed to go back to a first draft that had been growing cobwebs since 2013. Knowing I couldn't write longer than an hour freed me. I can write for an hour! When I check in the next Thursday, I can pick up where I left off and go another hour.

I know. An hour a week. Big deal. Stephen King write all day every day, 364 (I hear he takes his birthday off). I think about Toni Morrison who wrote at 4 am before her day job. I remember my old self, writing in car pool lines and the skating rink where my daughter spent 80% of her childhood. But life changes. I'm ....gasp...older. What hasn't changed is my love of writing. The Thursday Morning Zoomers remind me of that. Sometimes we don't remember why we are trying to write in a chaotic world that doesn't support creativity. We tell each other that is exactly why we need to keep going. Thanks to the Zoomers, I feel pretty confident of finishing another draft of my book this year. (Now whether anyone will ever read it is another issue. I try not to worry about that.)

So that's my new-old thing--writer's group. Writing is a solitary pursuit. There is no schmoozing at coffee break or getting together after work for happy hour. Sometimes you. have to crawl out of your cave and communicate with your own kind.

Once again I'm in the middle of major life changes--downsizing while renovating our forever house--in another state. So mostly I'm plodding along, an hour a week. Is it working? Some Thursdays I write for another couple of hours after we sign off. For the record, I wrote the first draft of this post during my Zoomer hour yesterday.

Keep writing, y'all.  The world needs us.

Posted by Mary Ann Rodman

What's old is new again!

Sharing the New Somethings I've so far planned for this new year 

has me smiling.

Here's why.

I collected so many 5 x 7 Little Ling Calendars since 1996, they 

became re-usable!

My calendar match for 2026?

1998...

...truly a Banner Year for me professionally.

Fingers crossed the New Somethings that follow be the first three 

of many that auger a similar year.

They certainly prove the adage "Everything old is new again."

New Something #1

I've returned to beginning each day writing my stories.

That practice led to 1998's publication of my first children's book, 

There Goes Lowell's Party!, as well as the sale of two picture 

books - Chicken Soup by Heart and Fancy That.

For eight weeks now, I've spent my mornings with a Story Star 

who claimed my heart and refused to let go. 

As luck would have it, her story is set in Philadelphia in the

late 1830's, the very time and setting of Fancy That.

First thing each morning, a fresh cup of coffee beside me, I'm

back in my limner Pippin Biddle's world, re-reading research

notes, paging through familiar reference books, immersing

myself in my character's story to learn who and what claim

her heart.

Fancy that!

New Something #2

I will not only teach one of the Chicago Newberry Library's

many singular workshops - "Oh, the Possibilities: Writing

for Children" on February 28.

For the first time ever, I will be a Newberry Library student,

registered and rarin' to go!

"Exploring Chicago's NorthSide" is an eight-week seminar 

that explores seven of Chicago's neighborhoods on the 

near North side through readings and Walking Tours.

I found my way to the Newberry Library soon after I began

teaching Writing for Children classes at Ragdale in 1998.

This year marks my 25th year of teaching (both in person

and virtually) "a bounty of new berries, each ripe with

story."

How nice to be a "new berry," too.

New Something #3

John F. Kennedy said, "Change is the law of life."

The Manuscript Workshop I've taught for the last ten

summers at the Landgrove Inn in Landgrove, Vermont 

now has:

    new dates - May 31 through June 5;

    new owners - Emily and Bruce Haupt;

    a new name - The Landgrove;

    a new chef - John Gould;

    and at long last, new Internet service!

The stars were aligned at SCBWI's 1998 Summer

Conference because not only was I named SCBWI's

Member of the Year, I met Barbara Seuling!

It was Barbara who mentored me to become a Writing

Coach, and as if that wasn't life-changing enough, 

Barbara gifted me with the opportunity to continue

her long-time Manuscript Workshop.

The Workshop evolved, so that now I both teach and

coach writers to help them tell their stories, in a much

smaller group limited to six.

Barbara's demand for Excellence and love of writing

for children remain ever present.

Here's to your New Somethings for a Banner Year!

Oh, and thanks to Susan at Chicken Spaghetti

for hosting today's Poetry Friday.

Esther Hershenhorn

P.S.

If this now-updated post looks familiar to some, 

it's because I mistakenly uploaded it on

January 23!

P.P. S.

Check out this virtual Newberry Library class:

"Laura Ingalls Wilder and the Little House Books:

'But It Was A Different Time Then."

New Ways To Tell Stories

 I am continuing the series of posts - Something New I’m Doing This Year. 

As an artist and a storyteller, I am always searching for new ways to tell stories.  There is a freedom to having many tools at one’s disposal, especially ones that are yet to be discovered. That is where the adventure lies. It is that place where fear and creativity meet and enchantment takes over.  The only way to discover these new tools for me, is to experiment and push the limits.  I love to learn new mediums and storytelling formats.  It’s intoxicating. 

I admit that stories often flood my imagination each having their own way that they want to be told.   Stories are often stubborn.   They have a mind of their own.  They won’t be shoehorned into the medium of my choice. I approach writing like I approach teaching.  I listen.  When these stories come aknockin. I try my best to put them into their requested form: board book, picture book, graphic novel, YA novel, etc.  

This year, I have pushed myself to add some new forms, formats and mediums to my repertoire. As an artist I love to learn the medium and its rules well so I can break them or combine mediums and formats to create new ways to tell stories.

I am learning to paint with oil paints and thinking about how I can push the medium by collaging on top of the still life paintings. I’m still getting the oil painting down.  It was great to take a class at Otis College of Art and Design.  I also see some water color classes in my near future.

Inspired by my fellow bloggers, I have flirted with poetry writing (adult themes), taking workshops at the longtime literary arts center, Beyond Baroque in Venice California.  Beyond Baroque was founded in 1968.  They have an amazing creative culture dedicated to poetry, literature and art. For those of you into Punk Rock, here’s a fun fact: Exene Cervenka and John Doe, of the band X, met at the long running Wednesday night poetry workshop in the mid 70’s. The Wednesday Poetry Workshop still happens online in addition to a Monday night Fiction Workshop also online.

click here for more information about Beyond Baroque

Executive Director Jimmy Vega

Existence Archived

When all is said and done,

All that remains

Are the cockroaches

Humans are arrogant.

We know we’re at the end

Our existence limited

Our time running out

For those who measure time

Cockroaches don’t

They live in the present

Our days are numbered

Data yet to be collected

But we know it

Intuitively

We know it,

The signs are there

Refusal to fade into oblivion

We have the technology to prevent this

To prove we were here

To prove we mattered

To prove it wasn’t all for nothing

Refusal to disappear,

Refusal to be forgotten

We madly archive our existence

Synthetic humans

Hold our place

In time and space

Generative AI

Generative extinction

We hate the cockroaches

They’ve always been here.

Survived before

Will survive beyond our wildest dreams

Dreams and thinking gone…

Sucked into devices

Sucked onto digital highways

Archived for later

The cockroaches don’t care.

They just don’t.

Erasure hurts.

By Zeena M. Pliska

With a few poems under my belt, I recently mustered up my confidence and even read for the first time at The Book Jewel, a local independent bookstore.

I am becoming more proficient in the art of filmmaking.  Recently, I participated in a 72-hour film challenge, producing, writing, and directing a short film that we’re preparing to submit to small, local film festivals.

Rough Edit of Don't Assume short film

I’m also learning to combine my newfound skill of poetry writing and filmmaking to create poetry videos.  My visual art in the past has always combined images and text.  I love adding moving pictures and sound to poetry, to create a different genre that pushes my storytelling to a new level.

All these newfound creative endeavors add to my kidlit writing in ways that I feel give it more breadth and depth, bringing cinematic writing to the table.  It also gives me new angles, avenues, and perspectives to approach new story themes. It feels expansive.

My life as an artist/storyteller runs parallel to my life as a teacher of 4 and 5-year-olds.  I utilize a Reggio -Inspired Approach in my public-school classroom (in Los Angeles).  

The approach comes from Reggio Emilia, Italy.  One of the components of this approach are the many uses of “languages.”  

THE HUNDRED LANGUAGES OF CHILDREN

NO WAY. THE HUNDRED IS THERE 

The child is made of one hundred.

The child has a hundred languages, a hundred hands, a hundred thoughts, a hundred ways of thinking, of playing, of speaking. 

A hundred always a hundred ways of listening, of marveling, of loving, a hundred joys for singing, and understanding, a hundred worlds to discover, a hundred worlds to invent, a hundred worlds to dream.

The child has a hundred languages (and a hundred, hundred, hundred more) but they steal ninety-nine. 

The school and the culture separate the head from the body.

They tell the child: to think without hands, to do without head, to listen, and not to speak, to understand without joy, to love and to marvel only at Easter and Christmas.

They tell the child: to discover the world already there and of the hundred they steal ninety-nine. 

They tell the child: that work and play, reality and fantasy, science and imagination, sky and earth, reason and dream, are things that do not belong together. 

And thus they tell the child that the hundred is not there. 

The child says: No way. The hundred is there. - Loris Malaguzzi (translated by Lella Gandini) 

Languages are defined as a multitude of materials that students use to communicate like paint, clay, wire, beads, recycled materials, natural materials, blocks, music, etc.  When I was first exploring and learning this approach, I spent a couple of days at a school in Portland, Oregon called the Opal School.  It was a public school that used the Reggio- Inspired Approach in a K-5 setting.  Unfortunately, the school has since closed but the lessons I learned in my observations remain almost 2 decades later.

I observed an amazing use of the Reggio-Inspired Approach that engaged students in storytelling using different “languages” (mediums).   They called it Story Workshop.   It has influenced the way I approach story crafting with my young students.  

 In my class, we use different “languages” to tell stories.  

After they have developed their story in different “languages”, they make books.  Because they don’t “write” yet, we write their words for them. We go through this process every day.  I find that it builds strong story crafters and writers.  Writing becomes effortless (developmentally appropriate) because it is tied to story and story is tied to the experimentation of different materials and not limited by format.

For me, I find that pushing the limits as an artist/writer makes my work more dynamic. It gives me possibilities that would not necessarily emerge if I was confined to one way of telling stories.  I hope I am passing this down to my young students so that they develop as writers also not confined to the page in prescribed and uninteresting ways. I hope that it habituates the creative process in their story crafting endeavors and keeps their writing fresh.

By Zeena M. Pliska

Author of 

Hello, Little One: A Monarch Butterfly Story

Egyptian Lullaby

Chicken Soup for the Soul for Babies Say Thank You? (But Why?)

Chicken Soup for the Soul for Babies A Gift For Me? (I Want It!)

A Writer's Agency

 

“This here story is all true, as near as I can recollect. It ain't a prettified story. Life as a river rat is stomping hard, and don't I know it. It's life wild and woolly, a real rough and tumble. But like Da said, life on the river is full of possible imaginations. And we river rats, we aim to see it through in our own way. That's the honest truth of it.” – Big River’s Daughter (Holiday House, 2013)

 

A common writing term explored in many workshops in that a character needs agency. A character’s agency is a concept that is easy to understand – whose story is it, after all? – but not always easy to execute. In my current WIP,  I’ve paid particular attention to my character’s agency, recognizing that readers identify and care about characters who have ownership of their journey.

Lorin Obergerger (Free Expressions) offers that agency is the character’s drive and desire to affect change,  a change that happens because of their active choices rather than a passive reaction to external forces. That a character is likely to act with agency when they are driven by both internal and external goals.

But as I continue to dig deeper into my protagonist, I’m beginning to think there’s more to agency than just character.  I’m beginning to think it is as much about the writer (me) as it is about the character.

Anyone pursuing a creative career knows that, by definition, such a career is full of risks. Living with uncertainty is routine and fear is commonplace. Doubt  becomes heavy and nerve-wracking. Rejection feels personal. It seems too often creatives survive on the whims of outside influences: the volatility of an  industry that favors the bottom line, craxy politics, whimsy trends and reader expectations. Oftentimes, the stakes are high and feels like an all-or-nothing setup. 

No wonder creatives give up.

Isabel Sterling (Real Talk for Writers ) has a wonderful talk that brings this discussion into focus. As she states: “Effective goal setting is just the first step of a successful year. Actually keeping those goals in mind, letting them guide your decisions, and staying committed through all the ups and downs of writing, publishing, and life is the hard part.”

In other words, having agency means redefining success – and failure. We may not have control about the external forces impacting our career, but we can actively choose how to navigate those forces to make the journey our own. And one important strategy is setting and processing our goals.

Key questions you want to consider short and long-term goals:

Why are you living this creative life? Why does it matter to you? What are your priorities overall and how does this creative career support (or not) these priorities? How does this help to define success for you?

As you redefine success, assume that success is available. Don’t think about the risks or the competition. Believing that you can achieve success encourages you to show up.

Just as important, question your assumptions about what’s required of you to achieve this success. Whether it’s a marketing plan or establishing social platforms, what works for one may not work for another. There are no rules that a creative ‘must’ do. Assume that it is possible to experience success on your own terms and do what’s best for you.

Another important factor as you think about short-term and long-term goals, consider how you feel about each of these. Focus on how you spend the journey rather than the end-result, the destination.  Easier said than done, of course, but by recognizing how you feel, or want to feel, about your creative process strengthens that internal agency for your journey. You are no longer struggling with the whim of the shifting industry and reader expectations; rather, you are discovering your purpose in a journey of your own making.

In other words, success redefined means that it is a journey, not a destination. The doing is most important, the outcome is simply chocolate frosting.

Wishing you a successful journey for 2026!

-- Bobbi Miller

 

Putting the "New" in the New Year

Happy New Year! We're kicking off 2026 here at TeachingAuthors with a series of posts about something new we're doing this year.  

My "new" goal is to incorporate more humor into my poetry. Lucky for me, shortly after deciding that I wanted my poems for young readers to be more playful, I learned about The Poet's Studio's online workshop "How to Write a Funny Poem with Chris Harris" this coming Monday, January 12, 2026. 

I was familiar with Harris's work from reading his 2023 title My Head Has a Bellyache: And More Nonsense for Mischievous Kids and Immature Grown-Ups illustrated by Andrea Tsurumi. You may recall that I blogged about reading Bellyache back in 2024. But I didn't mention then that the book has the most entertaining glossary of poetry terms I've ever seen--and the glossary is itself a poem! Here are the opening stanzas:

          GLOSSARY OF TERMS
          (from My Head Has a Bellyache)

     A simile flits like a songbird.
     A metaphor struts—it’s a bear.
     Personification
     Says, “There’s a gradation
     Of human in things everywhere.

     Alliterative language looks lovely.
     Consonance crackles and creaks.
     Assonance has
     A class-act pizzazz,
     While sibilance slithers and sneaks. 

          © 2023 Chris Harris. All rights reserved. 

You can read the whole glossary online, where Harris shared it as a series of posts on X. 

When I registered for the workshop, I discovered Bellyache was actually the second in a series that began with a book illustrated by Lane Smith called I'm Just No Good at Rhyming: And Other Nonsense for Mischievous Kids and Immature Grown-Ups. Both books are published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. 

Since rhyming is not my strong suit, I find the title especially appealing. But it's obviously not true, given the book's abundance of rhythm and rhyme. Booklist even called it "A magnificently wacky romp through verse." 

I don't know if writing poems like the ones in these two anthologies can be taught, but I'm looking forward to Monday's workshop. An extra plus: all the members of my poetry critique group will be there, too. Are any of you TeachingAuthors readers planning to attend? If you haven't registered yet, there may still be a few openings. You can learn more at Georgia Heard's The Poet's Studio website. 

Don't forget to check this week's Poetry Friday roundup by Ruth at There is no such thing as a God-forsaken town. 

Happy writing!

Carmela 

I'M GRATEFUL FOR AN AFTERNOON IN AMSTERDAM

 I'm not sure that "grateful" is the right word for this occasion. "Blessed" may be the better word.  After all, how many people ever get to visit their number one bucket list location? In April, Craig and I went to Amsterdam. April is the best time to be in the Netherlands. The weather is temperate, if occasionally drizzly. The tulips are in full and fabulous bloom. (Whatever else you might do in Amsterdam, you have to see the Keukenhof Gardens. Words fail me. See picture.)

Amsterdam is the most European of cities. Ancient architecture cozies up to postwar modernist buildings. Cobblestone streets and canals. Cathedrals and museums. Streetcars and swarms of cyclists. The very few personal cars are tiny and electric which makes for surprisingly clean air for an urban area. 

As exciting as all this was, there was one reason I was in Amsterdam. Anne Frank. Amsterdam was her city and I'd wanted to see it since I read The Diary of a Young Girl in fifth grade. Never had a book affected to me the way The Diary did. I felt as though I knew Anne. I identified with a precocious girl who was not taken seriously by adults. To a degree, I knew what it was like to be a pariah in your own town. I read and re-read her book so many times as a teen that I could recite whole entries. I absorbed the geography of her world...the "secret annex" in her father's office building where she hid for 25 months with seven other people. The Westertoren of Westkirk church, just a block from the Annex, whose carillon bells comforted Anne. Her apartment home on the Merweideplein, her school and the bookstore where she first spied the red and tan plaid cloth covered notebook that became the diary...these places were as real to me as my own neighborhood. 

                                                        The Anne Frank House, Westertoren on right.

Yes, we toured the Annex (known as the Anne Frank House. Warning: you have to buy the tickets seven weeks in advance, online at the House site...on a Tuesday at 4am Eastern time. The tickets sell out for the week in under an hour...and NO tickets are sold at the house...as some disappointed tourists learned while we were there.) The house was exactly as I expected it to be...except smaller.  I have performed in the stage version of The Diary and our stage was twice the size of the tiny common room in which the Franks and the others spent their days.  That room had no windows and was incredibly stuffy. The bedrooms did have windows but with blackout shades. Each room was smaller that the one before. I could only imagine how confined all of their occupants felt, but especially lively Anne. By the time I left, I was dizzy from lack of air and too many strangers pressing against me.

The Annex smelled of old wood and faintly of canal water. The front offices were furnished with desks and office equipment and advertisements for Mr. Frank's company, Opekta. The Annex area was empty, but large picture displays showed how the rooms looked during the Frank's stay. I came away with a better understanding of how physically difficult it had been to live in the Annex, to say nothing of terrifying.  The house was a shrine to the experience of the Franks and their friends, but I had a hard time feeling their presence. The only time I felt that connection was when the Westertoren chimed. 

I had anticipated that the Annex might affect me this way. That's why I booked a private tour of Anne's neighborhood in the Rivierenbuurt (the River District). I knew I would feel Anne's spirit there. 

                                                        The Anne Frank statue 

I met my guide at the Anne Frank statue in Merwedeplein Park. The statue depicts Anne the day she left her home for the last time...dressed in layers of clothes, her school bag under one arm and a small satchel in hand. That July day was warm and rainy; the family had a nearly 3 mile walk to the Annex.

Wide sidewalks border the park. The many pictures of Anne and her friends playing hopscotch and jumprope on that pavement came to mind. The neighborhood was built in 1929. By the time that the Franks' moved there from Germany in 1934, the park perimeter was marked by low, neatly trimmed hedges. No trees. Today the area is a lovely, leafy urban oasis. Tidy brick apartment flats face each other across the park. The Franks lived on the second floor at Number 37. The apartment has been restored to its pre-war appearance but is not open to the public. Instead, it's a retreat for refugee writers who cannot write freely in their home countries. (Anne would've liked that!) 

                                                                Number 37 Merweideplein

I have read every book published by Anne's friends, a surprisingly large number of whom survived the Holocaust. The Merweidepleine of the 1930's was almost entirely populated by German Jews, fleeing Hitler. Anne's girlfriends--Hanne, Sanne, Jacque, Nanny and Ilse--were constantly in an out of each other's apartments, They announced their presence by whistling through the mail slot in the front door. Anne could not whistle, but she could sing. She sang a series of notes--la-la-la-- into the slot, and her friends would know it was her. 

Around the corner stood the  bicycle sheds where Anne kept her beloved bike, until the Nazis forced the Jews to surrender them. The bike sheds also served as a sort of hangout place for the children before and after school. More than once Anne's diary speaks of meeting "an attractive boy"at the sheds. (Anne was quite the flirt.)

                                                               Montessori 6th (still a school)

                                                          
It must've been a short but pleasant bike ride to Anne's beloved Montessori School. Anne loved school and was heartbroken when the Nazis evicted Jews from "gentile schools" in 1941. She skipped a grade so she could join her older sister Margot at the Jewish Lyceum. The Lyceum was nearly three miles away from the Merweideplein without the benefit of bikes. The girls only attended the Lyceum for the 1941-42 school year. In the fall of 1942, the school closed because most of the students had been deported or were in hiding, including Anne and Margot.

With the 1940 Nazi invasion of the Netherlands, Jews were prohibited from most public areas--city parks, beaches, swimming pools, tennis courts, cinemas, theaters and on and on. Anne and her friends compensated for the lack of outside entertainment by forming a ping pong club since most of them had access to a table and equipment at home. After a strenuous afternoon of ping-pong, the girls would go in search of refreshment, at one of the two neighborhood ice cream parlors that would still serve Jews. This is one of them, the Adelphi.  Today it is a Japanese-Peruvian eatery, but Anne's image is immortalized inside.

It was a warm spring afternoon when my guide and I strolled the sidewalks of Anne's neighborhood. He was as versed in "Anne Lore" as I and we chatter about Anne and Margot and Hanne and Ilse as if they were our own friends. I felt as if one of the girls might suddenly pop from around a corner and say "hi." 

One of the honest surprises I encountered was the home of Miep Gies. As you might recall, Miep worked in Mr. Frank's office as a bookkeeper, and was one of the "Helpers" who kept the occupants of the Annex alive with forged ration cards, food and library deliveries, and anything else eight people in hiding might need to survive. I did not realize that Miep and her husband Jan's apartment was just around the corner from the Merweideplein. There is a tiny citizen's garden there, dedicated to Miep's memory.

Just outside the Merweidepleine we came to "Anne's bookshop" where her father bought her diary as a 13th birthday present. The same family still operates the store. Sadly, it was not open the day I visited but I saw a great deal through the plate glass windows that covered both street sides. Not surprisingly, the window displays were all copies of books about Anne, and the diary, translated into many languages. 

My tour ended back in front of Number 37 Merweidepleine. My guide pointed out something I had not noticed before, but that I had seen in the sidewalks throughout the afternoon. Embedded in the pavement were four small brass plates, one for each member of the Frank family.

"These are stolperstein," my guide explained. "These are memorial plaques for Holocaust victims, placed in front of their homes. These began in Germany about thirty years, and are now on sidewalks throughout Europe. "Stolpersteine" means "stumbling stone."  They are meant to be happened or stumbled upon, in memory of those who suffered under the Nazis. You have to stoop to read them, thus "bowing" to the memory of the person."

Each "stone" contains the person's birthdate, date they went into hiding. date of arrest, camps/prisons where they were held, and death date. Of the four Franks (and the eight in the Secret Annex) only Otto Frank survived the war.

I left "Anne's World" that sunny afternoon feeling that I had truly spent a couple of hours with her spirit. I feel very grateful. Also I am determined, to the best of my ability, to let the world "never forget."

Posted by Mary Ann Rodman

I'M GRATEFUL FOR THREE MILES OF HOPE

Howdy, Campers ~ and Happy Poetry Friday! (My poem, the link to Poetry Friday, and info on my next FREE class are all below)

I'm back from the NCTE convention in the Mile High City--Denver!

This year, the theme of the convention, DREAM BOLDLY, inspired uplifting and galvanizing sessions for the 8,000 educators, reading specialists, administrators, librarians, authors, poets, readers and more.

I just finished my second exhausting/exhilarating year of a three year term on NCTE's Poetry Awards Committee.  I've learned so much being on the committee. Last year--my first--was hard--a shock to my system, as I am not a fast reader. At first, books came a box at a time, and every day felt like Christmas.

Eventually? It felt like the sorcerer's apprentice--GAH! My bookshelves overflowed with magnificent and not-so-great books, and I stopped reading the morning paper because there were books to read and review on a daily basis. I could swear we were mailed 30,000 books each, give or take. 

This year was much easier. I was prepared. I asked for help from fellow committee members when I was brawling with google docs (where we posted our reviews), and they generously helped me.

Here's my wonderful committee feeling relieved, after finalizing our award choices (from right to left): Glenda Funk, Jongsun "Sunny" Wee, Junko Sakoi, Willeena Booker, Kasey Short, & me

The members are listed in more detail here.

And here are our winners:

(To read the list which includes the titles, authors, and illustrators, click on this link)

This the beautiful 40-foot high Big Blue Bear peeking into Denver's Convention Center

I felt a marked rise in hope for our democracy--both at home and at the convention. 

But today, I'm frightened by the news about Three Mile Island restarting operations. 

Even at the end of an exhilarating 3-mile hike with Sadie. Because I remember that terrifying spring day in 1979.   And I remember what I learned from the brilliant crusader, Dr. Helen Caldicott. When I heard her speak at UC Santa Barbara in the late 1970s or early 1980s; she changed my life.

Fear wound around me like thick rope. 

But...

For years, I've listed five things I'm grateful for each night and send it to a dear friend. Last night's gratitude list included:

*I'm grateful for today's outrageously, courageously wonderful 3-mile hike with Sadie.

*I'm grateful for my imagination. 

Still, Three Mile Island was too big. It took up too much space in my brain and my body. 

WHEN WILL THEY EVER LEARN?” I kept thinking. 

Then I thought back to my gratitudes.

My imagination piped up: "Honey, maybe you need to write about how you're coping (or not coping) right now. In fact," it continued, "listen to Pete Seeger and Joe Hickerson's song." Whereupon my imagination started singing Where Have All The Flowers Gone?...a little off-key, but still, it was moving...as is its refrain "When will they ever learn?"

"So," my imagination said, shoving me towards my laptop, "go copy that song's pattern. Make it a song of hope. You can do this!" 

(My imagination often scares the dickens out of me, but it can also be a compassionate cheerleader.)

And so, I limped to my laptop and wrote a rough draft of a poem...or perhaps it's a song. It only has two verses--it needs more. But it does contain seeds of hope:

WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE? 
by April Halprin Wayland
sung to the tune of the original song

We are planting flowers, child.
They’ll be rising
We are planting flowers, child
We’ll watch them grow
We are planting flowers, child
To share these seeds, let’s pass them on
Each day there’s more to learn
Each day there’s more to learn

We are shining beams of light
In the shadows
We are shining beams of light
Let’s make them glow
We are shining beams of light
Guide our neighbors through the night
Each day there’s more to learn
Each day there’s more to learn

poem © 2025 April Halprin Wayland.

Oh--I almost forgot--here's a bit of hope:

Come join my next 3-hour class on March 4, 2026 through UCLA Extension's Writers' Program class, INTRO TO WRITING THE CHILDREN'S PICTURE BOOK ~ A Workshop for Absolute Beginners 

Enrollment ends January 11^th...and classes fill FAST. Why? Because UCLA Extension offers 3-hour classes for FREE!

(After 26 years of teaching, do I still get nervous as my class begins? You betcha. But the moment I know my students and I are in that flow--that's the Great Gift.)

many thanks to Barney Saltzberg for this illustration

Note: this is a basic workshop for absolute beginners.

Learning to write a picture book in three hours is like

speed-dating.

On roller skates.

Down Mt. Everest.

Can you really learn everything you need to know in three hours?

No.

Still, the chase is quite exciting.

* * *

Thank you for reading this post. 

Now, it's your turn. 

What makes you grateful? 

What gives you hope? 

Thank you, Irene, for hosting Poetry Friday at Live Your Poem!

written with hope and gratitude for each of you
by April Halprin Wayland

with help from Sadie

Sadie this summer, taking a break
on a hot hike in Southern California