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Sunday, April 29, 2018

2018's Progressive Poem is HERE today!

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Howdy, Campers ~ And yikes!  The Progressive Poem is HERE today!


The Kidlitosphere Progressive Poem began in 2012 as a way to celebrate National Poetry Month (April) as a community of writers. Here's a three-way conversation between this poetry game's originator Irene Latham, Heidi Mordhorst, and Liz Steinglass just before 2018's poem sprouted.

This year, 30 poets signed on. Our mission: to grow the poem, one line at a time.

A few days ago, I posted a poem about my mixed-up feelings leading up to this momentous day. ...aka, the day I add a line.

This year, our instructions were: "take a minute to record your first impressions of how the [first] line strikes your imagination and what you think the poem might become."

So...I read the first line, by Liz SteinglassNestled in her cozy bed, a seed stretched.

Like so many others on this 30-day most excellent adventure, I was very happy with this first line because I like concrete, accessible images. I wrote:
Okay, a personified seed. Let's see...by nearly-the-end of this month, our seed will be
s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d to the max. Will she be a vine who crawls along the tops of walls? A tree who ages with each generation?


And my, my, look how our small seed has grown!  I loved Jan's line #5: invented a game. It grounded me; I couldn't wait to learn the rules of the game which Jasmine, Owl and Moon would play.  And then...off we veered! As Matt wrote: "the seed has invented a game, but she’s not playing it – which is a conundrum as far as a narrative goes." And as Heidi wrote:"you poets, you really know how to turn a ship with a well-chosen word!"

I liked Donna's prethinking of possibly including a sound, a texture, a smell...or perhaps, why be serious?  Donna jokingly toyed with the idea "that Jasmine slipped out of the owl's talons and fell to the ground and the owl ate her, The End..."

I was grateful for Sarah's grounding Jasmine on a trellis ("made of braided wind and song"~ such a pretty line) so that I could see her as a vine once more. I need images I can hold on to. (My favorite earrings are monarch butterflies. I also wear tiny bicycles, a little girl in a red dress, and big juicy slices of watermelon. My sister said: "I figured it out: you like to wear nouns.")

So, in order to be clear about what was going on in this poem, I printed it and added little drawings along the margin:
My notes. Star jasmine on the left, poet's jasmine on the right.
And boy, is its aroma intoxicating!

Along the way, Christie discovered that poet's jasmine is a real plant (which curls up the posts of our home--but I didn't know it was poet's jasmine! Thank you, for this, Christie!) According to one website, "give [this plant] heavy support [e.g., a trellis, etc.]." Isn't that what our warm community of poets and readers does?

Another site says, "this jasmine grows quickly and has a strong resilient root system." And that was my way in. I thought about what a young person could take away from our poem, especially in light of the fast-growing, newly awakened, resilient power of this generation.

So here's the poem thus far (I added a period after Kat's line):

Nestled in her cozy bed, a seed stretched.
Oh, what wonderful dreams she had had!

Blooming in midnight moonlight, dancing with
the pulse of a thousand stars, sweet Jasmine
invented a game.
“Moon?” she called across warm honeyed air.
“I’m sad you’re alone; come join Owl and me.
We’re feasting on stardrops, we’ll share them with you.”

“Come find me,” Moon called, hiding behind a cloud.

Secure in gentle talons’ embrace, Jasmine rose
and set. She split, twining up Owl’s toes, pale
moonbeams sliding in between, Whoosh, Jasmine goes.
Owl flew Jasmine between clouds and moon to Lee’s party!
Moon, that wily bright balloon, was NOT alone.
                                         Jas grinned,

                                                stretched,

                                                      reached,

                                                          wrapped

                                                        a new,

                                around           tender

                                         rootlet

a trellis Sky held out to her, made of braided wind and song.
Her green melody line twisted and clung.

Because she was twining poet’s jasmine, she
wiggled a wink back at Moon, and began her poem.
Her whispered words floated on a puff of wind,
filled with light and starsong. “Revelers, lean in –
let’s add to this merriment a game that grows
wordgifts for Lee. He’s a man who knows
selection, collection, and wisely advising
these dreamers, word-weavers, and friends.”

Jas enfolded Moon-Sky-Owl into the cup of her petals,
lifted new greens to the warming rays of spring. Sun

smeared the horizon with colour, as Jasmine stretched.
She felt powerful. She felt fresh. She bloomed and took a breath

The Progressive Poem is a kind of poet's relay race isn't it?
 So it is with a deep breath of relief, that I hand it over to dear Doraine...
  who takes us to the finish line!

Thanks for creating this, Irene ~ and thank you to every member of this year's team!2018 Progressive Poetry Contributors:
4 Michelle at Today's Little Ditty
5 Jan at bookseedstudio
6 Irene at Live Your Poem
7 Linda at TeacherDance
8 Janet F. at Live Your Poem
11 Brenda at Friendly Fairy Tales
12 Carol at Beyond LiteracyLink
13 Linda at A Word Edgewise
15 Donna at Mainely Write
16 Sarah at Sarah Grace Tuttle
18 Christie at Wondering and Wandering
19 Michelle at Michelle Kogan
20 Linda at Write Time
23 Amy at The Poem Farm
24 Mary Lee at A Year of Reading
26 Renee at No Water River
27 Buffy at Buffy's Blog
28 Kat at Kat's Whiskers
29 April at Teaching Authors
30 Doraine at Dori Reads 

posted with love by April Halprin Wayland, with help from Eli and Monkey
Monkey and Eli share a favorite poem
from Louis Untermeyer's The Golden Treasury of Poetry 

Friday, April 27, 2018

Progressive Poem for Progressive Poets--and our 9th Blogiversary!

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Howdy, Campers!

Happy National Poetry Month and Poetry Friday!  And Happy-Amazingness that we're celebrating TeachingAuthors9th Blogiversary--wowza!

As I wrote to our Founder, Coach, Computer Genius and Blogging Wizard, Carmela today: "I can't begin to tell you how glad I am that the universe reached all the way 'cross the country nine years ago and knocked on my door...


...it's been life-changing in many ways.  Thank you for starting it, thank you for captaining our ship."

Read Carmela's blogiversary post which includes JoAnn's terrific, short spring poem...then join in our combined Blogiversary/Earth Day celebration by passing along a book that helped you grow in your craft, or that was a favorite read aloud, or that you'd simply like to share with someone else.

April Halprin Wayland on World Book Night 2013,
giving away a book at Lawndale High School

JoAnn's perfect spring poem made me think of this quote (I cannot for the life of me find the rest of the poem--can you?) that makes my heart happy and my head swim:

I stuck my head out the window this morning and spring kissed me bang in the face. ~ Langston Hughes
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Onward!  If you don't know what the Progressive Poem is, hop on over to Irene Latham's post. Okay...so now you understand this poetry game, right? Well. My line's due this Sunday and here's my current state of my mind:

PROGRESSIVE IDEAS ABOUT PROGRESSIVE POEMS
by April Halprin Wayland
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I'm supposed to contribute, I'm pregnant to post.
I'm due to distribute, I'll be Sunday's host.
My foot is a-tapping, my thoughts overlapping:
no, don't think ahead—you'll for sure be misled.

Perhaps the main actor's a scarecrow instead
of the seed which we started with
(now it's a monolith!)

But here is a thought:
take a breath, take a vow...
light a lemony candle

and just 
be here now.

Poem (c)2018 April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved.

My line is due on Sunday. Wish me luck.

Here's Team Progressive Poem's posting schedule:
April 2018 ~ Progressive Poetry Contributors:
Jane at Raincity Librarian
Michelle at Today's Little Ditty
Jan at bookseedstudio
Irene at Live Your Poem
Linda at TeacherDance
Janet F. at Live Your Poem
11 Brenda at Friendly Fairy Tales
12 Carol at Beyond LiteracyLink
13 Linda at A Word Edgewise
15 Donna at Mainely Write
16 Sarah at Sarah Grace Tuttle
18 Christie at Wondering and Wandering
19 Michelle at Michelle Kogan
20 Linda at Write Time
23 Amy at The Poem Farm
24 Mary Lee at A Year of Reading
25 Kiesha at Whispers from the Ridge
26 Renee at No Water River
27 Buffy at Buffy's Blog
28 Kat at Kat's Whiskers
29 April at Teaching Authors note: this link won't work until Sunday, April 27, 2018
30 Doraine at Dori Reads 
And thank you, dear Irene, for hosting
the last Poetry Friday of National Poetry Month 2018
at Live Your Poem!

PS: Before you go, share in the comments if you have a book you're planning to pass along in honor of our Blogiversary/Earth Day celebration!

posted with overflowing love to my sister TAs and with trepidation about you-know-what by April Halprin Wayland



Friday, April 20, 2018

Our 9th Blogiversary: Spring Cleaning and New Beginnings


Believe it or not, this Sunday, April 22, we will celebrate our
Ninth Blogiversary!

After reflecting on this milestone, I'll share a lovely spring poem from former TeachingAuthor JoAnn Early Macken.


In some ways, it feels like it was only last week that Esther Hershenhorn and I met to brainstorm ideas for a group blog. But, strangely enough, it also feels like we've been blogging here forever, especially when I think about how the children's publishing industry has changed in the last nine years.

For those of you who are relatively new to our blog, I'm pleased to report that four of the current six TeachingAuthors have been here since we founded this site back in 2009: April Halprin Wayland, Esther Hershenhorn, Mary Ann Rodman, and me (Carmela Martino). You can see the four of us, plus former TeachingAuthor JoAnn Early Macken, in the photo below, taken when we presented together at a conference some years ago.

From left to right: Mary Ann Rodman, Esther Hershenhorn, JoAnn Early Macken, Carmela Martino, and April Halprin Wayland.
While I miss JoAnn and the other TeachingAuthors who have left the team, I'm thrilled to have Bobbi Miller and Carla Killough McClafferty with us now to add their unique perspectives to our topics. If you'd like to read more about our current and past TeachingAuthors, check out the About Us page.  Also, I encourage those of you who teach or have aspiring young writers at home to visit our recently updated Young Writers page, which includes links to tips specifically for young writers and sites where they can get their work published. If you have any sites we should add to the list, please let us know in the comments.

Just as our TeachingAuthors team has changed over the years, so has our posting schedule. We originally blogged three days a week, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. A few years ago, we cut back to Mondays and Fridays only, with an occasional Wednesday Writing Workout. As we begin our tenth year, we've decided to drop our Monday posts. Beginning today, we'll blog regularly on Fridays only, with occasional Wednesday Writing Workouts and other special posts.

We have two main reasons for the change: 1) We fear that with the rise of social media, our readers are having trouble keeping up with all the information being shared online. [I know I am!] And 2) We'd like to have more time for our own writing and teaching. We hope you, our readers, won't be too disappointed by this change in our schedule. We'd love to have your feedback on it in the comments.

In honor of our Blogiversary, I've been doing some virtual spring cleaning here on our site, removing obsolete links, updating information, etc. I've also been spring cleaning my home office. One of the things I discovered was that I have a second, never-used copy of Connie Epstein's classic book The Art of Writing for Children. This is one of my all-time favorite books on the craft of writing for children and teens--I still quote from it in some of my classes. While the info in the section on "Finding and Working with a Publisher" may have changed greatly over the years, the basic instruction on the craft of writing, which composes the majority of the book, still applies. So, rather than put the book in the paper recycling, I plan to bring it to the next writers' meeting I attend and offer it to anyone there who may be interested. Seems appropriate, since our Blogiversary happens to fall on Earth Day!


When I told my fellow TeachingAuthors about the book, Esther suggested that I invite you, our readers, to join in our combined Blogiversary/Earth Day celebration by passing along a book that helped you grow in your craft, or that was a favorite read aloud, or that you'd simply like to share with someone else.

Despite all this spring cleaning, it hasn't felt much like spring around here--lots of cold, gray days and even some snow in the Chicago area. And it's been even worse in other parts of the country. I hope that by sharing the following poem written by JoAnn Early Macken, I'll be able to coax some spring construction around here. Thank you, JoAnn!

     Construction Crew
     by JoAnn Early Macken

     Daffodils bulldoze last year’s leaves.
     Chickadees haul twigs and straw.
     Woodpeckers hammer on trembling trees,
     and crows call out, “Saw! Saw!”
     Their annual project’s a glorious thing—
     they’re building a brand-new spring!

copyright JoAnn Early Macken, who holds all rights

Don't forget to check out this week's Poetry Friday roundup over at The Opposite of Indifference. Before you go, though, do share in the comments if you have a book you're planning to pass along in honor of our Blogiversary/Earth Day celebration!

And remember to always Write with Joy!
Carmela

Monday, April 16, 2018

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words


I’m working on choosing final images that will go in my book Buried Lives: The Enslaved People of George Washington’s Mount Vernon.  Images are critical for a nonfiction book like this.  

One part of the book includes a chapter about the archaeological dig that is taking place in the Slave Cemetery at Mount Vernon.  I want to include photos of volunteers working there and there are some great images to choose from.  But each photo needs to meet a list of factors for it to work for the book.  

This is a photo of me working the sifter during the dig.  While it does fit the text of the book it is more important to use images of other volunteers.

I took this photo, but it isn't the right choice to be in the book.  Other images are better and will carry more weight.

Here are a few details I look for when choosing a photo for my book: 

Is it needed?  Photos take up a lot of real estate in a book, so each image must carry it’s weight and be worth the space.  

It must compliment the text. The photo needs to either add a deeper understanding to what I’ve written or give a platform to use more information in the caption to get across information that didn’t fit within the text.    

It matters what is in the background of the pic.  Does what is behind or beside the subject add to the photo?  Or can it be cropped?

Is it blurry?

Is the photo hi res enough for publication?  Some images must be deleted because they aren’t good enough for print.  


THIS FOLLOWING PART IS ABSOLUTELY CRITICAL!


—you must have written permission to use 
every photo you publish.    


And finally for me at least, I want to make sure I have permission from the people who are in the photos (if they are recognizable).  I’m working on this part right now.  While the photos I want to use technically belong to Mount Vernon, the people in the photos are volunteers.  So I want each one of them to tell me it is acceptable for me to use the photo in my book.   To ask for permission, I’ve got to communicate with them.  Sometimes that is harder than it sounds.  At times I’ve had to be a real bloodhound to find people. It is all part of the research. Just this morning I sent out another round of emails seeking permission from people in the pics I want to use.  I hope to hear from them very soon because the book is with the book designer now.  If I don’t hear from them giving me permission, the pic won’t be in the book. 

Got to go now—maybe the people I’m looking for sent me an email . . . I hope so.   

Carla Killough McClafferty 


Friday, April 13, 2018

I Love Novels in Verse

 My turn to weigh in on National Poetry Month. Topic: novels in verse.  I'm fascinated with this way of storytelling, and have been trying to write one myself for longer than I care to reveal.

My hero, Karl Shapiro--writing his verse in the Pacific during WWII
 I don't get regular poetry (especially the rhyming kind).  Maybe it was the dismal poetry I was "exposed" to in school. Two weeks of Longfellow...we ALWAYS had two weeks of Longfellow.  You spend two weeks reading Evangeline and see if you don't want to pull your hair out.

The only poet I really loved was Pulitzer Prize Poetry winner, Karl Shapiro (who incidentally, was the only then-living-poet was in my high school literature books). Not only was he my introduction to free verse ("It doesn't HAVE to rhyme?) but he wrote about concrete situations and objects that I recognized.  You gotta love a guy whose poems had titles like "Auto Wreck" and "Manhole Covers." Nary a daffodil, meadowlark or fluffy cloud wafted through his poems. He influenced me to write terrible free verse, which I thought was terribly profound...like Shapiro. (I was 16. I eventually forgave myself.)

Mostly, I learned to slink down in my seat whenever we had a "poetry unit."

Fast forward 20 years. I was a university librarian when I discovered my first verse novel, Make Lemonade by Virginia Euwer Wolff. Wow! A story told in free verse...so free that you are never sure of the personal details of the main character, LaVaughn, and her friend, Jolly. What they look like, where they live. Wolff leaves the reader to fill in those details for himself. Each poem like a chapter. A one or two page chapter. What a concept!! This was a literary whack on the side of the head. Of course, I reasoned, this was just a quirky concept. No one else would ever write such an outrageous book. Of course I was wrong. Wolff 's sequel, True Believer, won the National Book Award and was a Printz Honor book.

Fast forward, and it's 1998.  The next verse novel that caught my attention was Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse, that year's Newbery winner. Not only a Newbery winner, but also winner of the Scott O'Dell Award for best historical fiction. This is in My Top 10 of Books Published in the Last 20 years. It has everything I look for in a book--a girl standing up to hard times (in this case, the American Depression--one of my favorite historical periods) An absent parent, and one who is emotionally absent. A struggle for a dream. All in free verse. I know some people don't share my love of this book. Well, we all have our opinions and now you know mine.

The last book that blew me away with it's innovation was Ellen Hopkins' first YA novel, Crank. Aside from Hopkins fearlessly tackling the road to drug abuse taken by the main character, Kristina/Bree, the author's poems are visually stimulating. Some chapters are obviously shape poems. In some there seems to be two separate poems on the same page.  Each is a poem to itself, but they are arranged so that they can be read as one whole. Who does this? (I'm sure someone else had before Crank was published in 2004, but I hadn't read it.) The way the poem is set on the page is organic to the words. Hopkins pulls no parlor tricks with her poetry. The poem looks that way, because it reads that way. (There are two more volumes in the Crank trilogy; Glass and Fallout.)

So why am I hooked on novels in verse? Certainly not because they are easy to write. They're not. The book may be 300 pages, but with this style of writing and page lay out, the actual word count is ridiculously low. As with picture books, every word must count. The writing is vivid, tight, and packs an emotional punch with the fewest words possible. It's a real writing challenge. Trust me; I know!

It is an easy read for the student, without the student being aware of how easy it is. They see a 300 page book, and think Nope. I don't like to read. I don't have time. I'm not a good reader. (Pick one.) Then they open the book and see all that lovely white space, a relatively small amount of words. (Nothing says I don't want to read this than large blocks of description.) Since each page or two is a complete episode, if not an entire chapter, the reader can put down the book without fear of losing track of the narrative when he picks it up again.

I have heard verse novel detractors dismiss the form as "just creatively arranging sentences on a page." If that is all there is to a book, just rearranging sentence breaks, or turning each page into a shape poem (which would be exhausting to write and read)I would agree. But I've never read a bad verse novel, and I've read every thing published in this genre for the last 20 years. You have to be a darn good writer to pull it off. A number of writers (Ellen Hopkins comes to mind) were primarily poets before attempting a verse novel.

The years I've spent writing and revising and ultimately rejecting my own verse novel have not been in vain. In the X number of years I've had this project in my computer (and head) I've honed my sense of what makes these books work. To contemplate why my book should be a verse novel. I have concluded that the subject is so intense that it bogs down in regular prose. I tried to write it that way for two years before I made the big leap to verse. Once I started, I knew this is the only way the story would make sense. to me.

I have this season's verse novels--Blood Water Paint by Joy McCullough, The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo, Forget Me Not by Ellie Terry (this came out last year)--all cued up and ready to read on my Kindle. Perhaps one of them will have the key, the clue, the Golden Ticket that will help me finish my own book.

Now go read a verse novel!

AND WE HAVE A WINNER!

The winner of our giveaway 30 People Who Changed the World edited by Jean Reynolds is....

Buffy S!

Congratulations, Buffy S. and thank you to all who entered out giveaway. Watch this space for our next giveaway.

Posted by Mary Ann Rodman

Monday, April 9, 2018

The Crowned Prince of Poetry

Photo by Charles Egita

We continue celebrating National Poetry month. Esther started off our celebration of National Poetry Month; April had a fabulous time at the Poetry Rodeo created and sponsored by Pomelo Books. As she puts it, “Truly P-o-e-t H-e-a-v-e-n.”

As we celebrate National Poetry Month, we also celebrate its luminaries, and none shines brighter than Lee Bennett Hopkins. If ever there was royalty in poetry, then surely the crowned Prince of Poetry would be the irrepressible Lee Bennett Hopkins. Educator, poet, author, and anthologist, he has written and edited over 100 books for children.Once a senior consultant to Bank Street College's Learning Resource Center, and a curriculum specialist for Scholastic Magazines, Inc, Lee has written and edited numerous award-winning books for children and young adults,  professional texts and curriculum materials. He has taught elementary school and served as a consultant to school systems throughout the country. In 1989, Lee received the University of Southern Mississippi Medallion for “outstanding contributions to the field of children’s literature” in recognition of his work; 2009 brought him the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Excellence in Poetry for Children, in recognition of his body of work. In 2010 he received the Florida Libraries’ Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2016, Hopkins received the prestigious Regina Medal award sponsored by the Catholic Library Association. Lee founded several poetry awards, including  the Lee Bennett Hopkins Award for Poetry in 1993 in cooperation with Pennsylvania Center for the Book.

No wonder Lee is, according to Guinness World Records, "the world’s most prolific anthologist of poetry for children.”

Been to yesterdays,
lived through todays.
Looking on toward tomorrows -
new characters, new plays.
The whys of life change,
and so do ways,
new scenery is built,
to fill an empty stage.
(Been to Yesterday, Poems of a Life, Boyds Mill Press, 1995)


Lee has an amazing new collection out this very month: World Make Way: New Poems Inspired by Art from The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

 Of all his anthology collections, this is – in my opinion – his most stunning, inspired by the Leonardo Da Vinci quote, "Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen." 

 As Lee explains during an NPR interview, “… the whole book is really based on a form from the Greek called ekphrastic poetry, where poems are inspired by art. I assigned these varied paintings to 18 of the top children's poets in America who would then write their emotions toward the painting. Rather than describing the painting, it's what they feel.”





The artists represented include Mary Cassatt and Winslow Homer. A painted plaster fragment from Egypt 1390-1353 B.C inspired Irene Latham's "This Is the Hour.” An illustrated manuscript "Book of the Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices" by al-Jazari inspired Naomi Shihab Nye’s “It’s All Magic.” Marilyn Singer’s “Paint Me”, inspired by Gustav Klimt's " Mada Primavesi, 1912-13," celebrates the painting’s defiant subject with the resolute phrase and title of the collection: “World, make way.”

One of the more dramatic poems comes from Cynthia Cotten, inspired by Rosa Bonheur's oil painting, The Horse Fair.
 
The Horse Fair, Rosa Bonheur (French, Bordeaux 1822–1899 Thomery). Public Domain.



RESISTANCE

He calls himself a handler,
this puny person
with his rope, his shouts,
his “I am your master”
attitude.


Thinks he can subdue me,
stifle my spirit,
bend me
to
his will.


But no, I say,
no!
I will not be broken,
controlled,
tamed.


Let others trot willingly
towards servitude,
obedience,
confinement—
towards mere
existence.


I choose life.
Alone
in the light of my
magnificence,
I will fight
until no fight
remains.

(©Cynthia Cotten 2018. All rights reserved)


For more history on Lee, check out these interviews with Joanna Marple and Miss Marple Musings interview from 2016 and Cynthia Leitich Smith’s interview from 2009, in which he discusses “... his unflagging belief that poetry is a necessity for children, at home and in the classroom.” 

Bobbi Miller

Friday, April 6, 2018

POETRY STICKS TO YOUR CLOTHES and PHOTOS OF POETS!

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Howdy, Campers!

And yes, it's National Poetry Month!

But first...midnight tonight is the deadline to enter our book giveaway for a chance to win 30 PEOPLE WHO CHANGED THE WORLD (Seagrass, 2018).  Check out Carla Killough McClafferty’s March 26 interview with the book’s editor Jean Reynolds, then scroll down from the interview to enter our TeachingAuthors drawing.

Esther started off our celebration of National Poetry Month; now it's my turn.

I'm at the Texas Library Association's Annual Conference, #TLA18, having a fabulous time at the Poetry Rodeo created and sponsored by Pomelo Books.  Truly P-o-e-t H-e-a-v-e-n.


Here are a few photos from My Most Excellent Adventure:

me, ready for the conference!


Janet Wong

Dr. Sylvia Vardell & Juan Felipe Herrrera

David Harrison

Carmen T. Bernier-Grand  & Ann Whitford Paul

 the best 1/2 of Margarita Engle, Kathi Appelt, Nancy Bo Flood, Bob Raczka

my apologies to the rest of my poet friends whose photos were too blurry to share!

Ah, poetry.

Poetry Month inspired me to begin writing a poem a day in 2010...and I've never looked back. Maybe it will inspire you to write a poem each day, too.

This one is from August, 2013:

A POEM STICKS TO YOUR CLOTHES
by April Halprin Wayland

It's like something that clings to your shirt—
one of those blue sticky flowers,
or a foxtail.

At the end of the day,
you take off your jacket
and there it is,

soft like a real fox's tail,
tenacious,
pointed,

and sometimes
painful.

It must be dealt with.

poem (c) 2018 by April Halprin Wayland, who holds all rights

...here's the backstory, which I wrote to my friend Bruce, who also writes a poem a day--we send them to each other:

Gary came home last night and I was frantic because I like to write my poem before he comes home.  At least THAT.  So he came home and I asked him if he had any ideas for a poem, for something that sticks...and as I said it, I got an image of the things that stick to my clothes on a hike and I was off and running.

Sometimes God is good to me.

Well, most times, actually.


Make sure you check out Jama Rattigan's Kidlitosphere Poetry Events Round Up...

Then scoot on over to Amy at The Poem Farm, this week's Poetry Friday host

posted with love by April Halprin Wayland, who is grateful to our kind and inclusive Poetry Friday tribe