12 Years! A Thanku and Another #HaikuFromTwo

Happy Poetry Friday! This post includes a Thanku and a #HaikuFromTwo.

As Esther shared in her post kicking off our current series, this month we're celebrating our TWELFTH Blogiversary! I can hardly believe it's been that long. This blogging journey has been filled with wonderful surprises and blessings. One of those surprises was the TeachingAuthors' virtual meeting Esther shared a photo of in her post. I thought that meeting was to learn some great new Zoom teaching tips from the amazing April Halprin Wayland. Instead, it was a party to celebrate our blog and my efforts to keep it running all these years. My fellow TeachingAuthors showered me with thanks that day. But I am just as grateful for all of them and what they've contributed to this blog over these dozen years. And I'm grateful to you, our readers, for traveling along with us. 

Esther didn't mention in her post the lovely gift my fellow TeachingAuthors sent me that day, as if the surprise meeting wasn't enough:

I smile every time I see these lovely plants (which are still blooming).   

This month, each of us are sharing a favorite post written by one of our fellow TeachingAuthors. My heart is so filled with gratitude for our blogiversary milestone that if felt appropriate to remind you all of Esther's terrific post introducing us to the Thanku: a haiku expressing gratitude. Esther inspired us to feature thankus often over these twelve years. You'll find many of those posts here. I'd like to add one more to that collection:

For my fellow TeachingAuthors and All Our Readers:
       My heart overflows
       like a basket of flowers,
       still growing. Thank you.
©2021 Carmela A. Martino. All rights reserved.

Speaking of haiku, this week I wrote another #HaikuFromTwo. I shared last month about Amanda Davis's #HaikuFromTwo challenge: you randomly pick two words from a book you're reading and create a haiku using them. After Beverly Cleary's recent death, I thought it would be fitting to read one of her books. Unlike most writers I know, I never read any of Cleary's work until I was an adult, and that book was Ramona Quimby, Age 8. A few weeks ago, I finally read the first Ramona book: Beezus and Ramona.  Today's #HaikuFromTwo includes two random words from that book: drawing (page 45) and pretend (page 159):

Be sure to check out this week's Poetry Friday roundup by Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core.

Happy writing!
Carmela

PS: Congratulations to Linda M, winner of our giveaway of JoAnn Early Macken's new book, Grow!

Two #HaikuFromTwo--from the Heart

Happy Poetry Friday! Today I share two original haiku as I continue our series on "matters of the heart." Esther kicked off this topic the week of Valentine's Day by discussing three books that have recently touched her reader's heart. I'm taking a slightly different view, talking instead about my writer's heart, as Mary Ann did in her post.

I mentioned back in December that one of the things I was looking forward to in 2021 was "becoming even more steeped in poetry, both reading and writing it." I'm happy to say I've been following through on that intention. So I was especially pleased when I read a Storystorm 2021 post by Amanda Davis in which she described her #HaikuFromTwo challenge as a way to find story ideas. Here's the graphic she shared in her post:

I loved the idea! At the time, I was reading From the Desk of Zoe Washington (Katherine Tegen Books) by Janae Marks The two random words my finger landed on were lemonade (page 77) and play (page 155). I came up with the following #HaikuFromTwo and Tweeted it on Feb. 3:

Next, I read the novel-in-verse Reenie’s Turn (Regal House Publishing) by my friend and fellow SCBWI-IL author Carol Coven Grannick. The random words I fell upon in that novel were mysterious (page 31) and window (page 150. On March 2, I Tweeted the following #HaikuFromTwo:

I really enjoyed writing these #HaikuFromTwo--they're a quick way to nourish my writer's heart. So I plan to keep writing them. You can follow me on Twitter if you'd like to see what I come up with next. (I also Tweet links to our latest TeachingAuthors posts there.)

Meanwhile, make sure to check out this week's Poetry Friday roundup by Heidi Mordhorst at my juicy little universe.

Happy writing!
Carmela