Shake It Up! It’s National Poetry Month!

                Draw a crazy picture,
               Write a nutty poem,
               Sing a mumble-gumble song,
               Whistle through your comb.
               Do a loony-goony dance,
‘             Cross the kitchen floor,
              Put something silly in the world
              That ain’t been there before.
              - Put Something In, Shel Silverstein

We’re one day in to National Poetry Month, the perfect occasion to shake it up!
Hurrah to the American Academy of Poets for gifting us with 30 original ways to do just that.

You could memorize a poem,
or enter the Dear Poet project,
pocket a ballad,
or chalk an ode on sidewalks.
Maybe request more U.S. stamps honor poets.
Or, why not buy a book of poems, say, SHAKING THINGS UP – 14 YOUNG WOMEN WHO CHANGED THE WORLD (Harper, 2018).

Women’s History Month concluded but two days ago, right?     
So Susan Hood’s collection is the perfect poetic companion to 30 PEOPLE WHO CHANGED THE WORLD (Seagrass, 2018), which happens to be our Book Giveaway through April 6. In fact, both books include tributes to Malala Yousafzai.
Be sure to read Carla Killough McClafferty’s March 26 interview with the book’s editor Jean Reynolds, then scroll down to enter our TeachingAuthors drawing.

Each of the 14 featured young women in Hood’s collection shook up the world and sparked change in revolutionary ways through singular persistence and determination – from Molly Williams, the first American female firefighter in the early 1730’s to teenage cancer researcher Angela Zhang in 2011.  In between, readers meet through Hood’s poetic portraits, each paired with the art of 1 of 13 female illustrators, inspiring role models who represent multiple disciplines – architect Maya Lin, storyteller Pura Belpre, WWII secret agents Jacqueline and Eileen Nearne and Mae Jemison, the first African American woman in space.  Hood uses various poetic forms to craft her snapshots: ballads, alphabet poems, concrete poetry, limericks.  Rich on a multitude of levels, SHAKING IT UP will soon have young readers, both male and female and of all ages, doing just that.

I discovered Susan Hood’s book of poems on Sylvia Vardell’s Poetry for Children Sneek Peek List for 2018.
Check out this extensive list of winners along with Betsy Bird’s List of Best Poetry Books of 2017 for other book-purchasing/book-reading titles.
Both lists will give you LOTS of choices for poems you might even want to pocket on April 26, Poem-in-your-Pocket Day.

Happy Poetry Month!

Remember to shake things up!

Esther Hershenhorn
p.s.
Check out the ballad by Mary Schmich I’m pocketing on April 26 in honor of another celebration this month – i.e. the start of Major League Baseball, and my certain-to-shake-things-up Chicago Cubs.

Final Poem in Your Pocket for Poetry Month 2016

.
Howdy Campers!

Well...how was your Poetry Month?  We TeachingAuthors celebrated our 7th (!) Blogiversary (with a book giveaway--details in that link).

Mine was a blur of activity because my new Passover picture book came out, I'm teaching this quarter, and there were a gazillion other things I was going to tell you but that I can't actually remember right now. But they were important. And they were right here a minute ago...

Photo of me from Morguefile.com

Poetry Month is ending for me this weekend in a cheerful house by a dreamy creek with a bit of yoga. That, right there, is a poem, don't you think?

Although Poem in Your Pocket Day was officially April 21st this year, I'm offering one more to close out this delicious month.

I was looking through bird poems I've written, and this one made me want to tap dance. And I am not a tap dancer.

So here's my tap dancing thank you to every bird in the Kidlitosphere-and-beyond who've splashed into this poetry pond intending to stay only a minute or two...and who have now built cheerful homes here.

A Kidlitosphere Poetry Friday selfie

CROW TALK
by April Halprin Wayland

There's a sound crows make when they gather in a crowd.

It's a woody kind of note and it's not very loud

like knuckles that are rapping on the front porch door

or a tap dancer tapping on the cracked dance floor.

When one crow makes it, the whole crowd stops.

I wonder what it means, this woodland knock?

There's a hawk in the clouds? There's a hunter on the ground?

I watch them and I practice, teach my tongue to make that sound.

Listen—I can do it! Now my mouth knows how to knock.I'm a smooth feathered bird-- I can talk crow talk.

poem (c) 2016 by April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved.

This is actually true: I know one word in crow.      

And another thing that's true: you still have time to enter TeachingAuthor's 7th Blogiversary Giveaway to win the newest edition of  Carmela Martino's new edition of  Rosa, Sola (which got a starred review in BookList)! Read all about it and enter our giveaway here.

Thank you for hosting PF today, Buffy!

posted by April Halprin Wayland, tick-tock-clocking with her tongue

Wednesday Writing Workout: Take a Walk!

Here in Wisconsin, spring is taking its time as usual. Gradual warmups and sudden temperature drops are part of its annual appearance. The other day, we woke to snow on our just-sprouting flowers. I looked outside and decided to use what was right in front of me in a poem to express my impatience with the process.

Outside our kitchen window, a goldfinch in its bright spring plumage perched on the thistle feeder. What a happy sight! I tried to think of another positive detail. Well, I realized, since Daylight Saving Time, at least it's staying lighter later. But--and this is the point--it's still so cold! And there was my first stanza, planned in my head before I even picked up a pen.

No, that doesn't always happen.

Other details  organized themselves into second and third stanzas: daffodils burdened by a heavy layer of snow. Would they recover? Probably. We've seen that happen before. Icy puddles? Yes, of course.

Then I went for a walk. As I stopped to gaze at someone else's daffodils, I found an opportunity to add personification to my poem: they were not just "beneath what every flower dreads / clumps of snow" but "wearing what a flower dreads / coats of snow."

Then I decided that the flower description was too obvious. I changed the adjective from "yellow" to "bobbing" and the verb from "nod" to "bow," adding alliteration that might not have occurred to me had I not been standing in front of the daffodils. Here's the poem with those revisions.

Any Day Now 

Goldfinches are brightening.
The evening sky is lightening.
But wind chills still are frightening.
When will we see spring? 

Daffodils in flower beds
bow their bobbing flower heads
wearing what a flower dreads:
coats of snow that cling. 

The puddles April showers bring
are icy now from winds that sting.
Winter weighs on everything!
When will we see spring?

Stuck on a poem? Use what's in front of you. Look out a window. Go for a walk. Somehow the regular rhythm of walking helps, too.

Tomorrow is National Poem in Your Pocket Day! Read the other Teaching Authors posts in this series to discover some of our favorite poems. And remember to carry one of your favorites!

JoAnn Early Macken

Post #999, and the Poem in My Pocket

In honor of National Poetry Month, today I'll be sharing the Poem in My Pocket. But first, a word about a blog milestone. When I went to create this post, I noticed it will the 999th we've published here on TeachingAuthors!

The REAL celebration begins one week from today, when we commemorate our SEVENTH blogiversary! Hard to believe we've been at this that long. I speak for all the TeachingAuthors when I say we're so very grateful for the wonderful connections we've made through this blog. But more on that next week.

For today, I want to continue our current topic. In honor of next Thursday's Poem in Your Pocket Day, each TA is sharing the poem in her pocket. I've thoroughly enjoyed reading all the choices so far. (If you missed them, Bobbi provides links along with her pocket poem in her post.)

I haven't been writing poetry lately, so instead of trying to write a poem a day for National Poetry Month I decided to read one. After Myra's post at Gathering Books introduced me to Mary Oliver's Felicity (Penguin), I chose that wonderful collection as the source of my poems for this month.

When I read the very first poem, "Don't Worry," on April 1st, I felt as though Oliver was speaking directly to me. I've been feeling frustrated about how long it's taking me to complete several major writing projects, especially my project to indie publish Rosa, Sola to bring it back into print. Oliver's poem was just what I needed that day, which happened to be Good Friday, a day of fasting and prayer for me:

    Don't Worry
    by Mary Oliver

    Things take the time they take. Don't
        worry.
    How many roads did St. Augustine follow
        before he became St. Augustine?

         from Felicity © 2015

As I continue along this treacherous, twisty road of children's publishing, having Oliver's poem in my pocket gives me solace and inspiration. I'm looking forward to finding more inspiration in this week's Poetry Friday roundup, which is at Michelle's Little Ditty. If you don't already have a poem for your pocket, perhaps you'll find one there!

Happy writing!
Carmela

Butterfly Laughter and Nana's Lap

No. 1 Granddaughter

Teaching Authors continues to celebrate National Poetry Month! And especially National Poem in Your Pocket Day! 

I have so enjoyed the wisdom of my fellow TAs when it comes to poetry. April started with Steven Withrow’s “What Makes a Turbine Turn” from Janet Wong and Sylvia Vardell's new anthology, The Poetry of Science: The Poetry Friday Anthology for Science for KIDS.

Mary Ann shared the moving and memorable “92” by e.e. cummings, and April returned with a Wednesday Writing Workout about rhyming patterns in poetry. Finally, JoAnn introduced us to her darling Rosy.

I am not so wise on poetry. I do not know how to write poetry. I am in awe of those that do. Mr. Poetry Himself, Lee Bennett Hopkins, defines the artform as an experience (Pass The Poetry Please, 3rd Ed., 1998)  that has been distilled to its emotional core. Life itself, he says, is embodied in poetry, and each poem reveals a bit of life. (12).

Recently I became a grandmother for the first time. I am a Nana. These words are profound to me. Too big for me to explain in simple sentences. I never knew my grandparents. And, because life happens, my daughter did not know her grandparents, at least not very well.  Her memories are  fuzzy images  that lack touch, sound and smell.

So the little poems in my pocket are my cheatsheets, teaching me what it means to be a Nana.

Butterfly Laughter by Katherine Mansfield

In the middle of our porridge plates
There was a blue butterfly painted
And each morning we tried who should reach the
butterfly first.
Then the Grandmother said: "Do not eat the poor
butterfly."
That made us laugh.
Always she said it and always it started us laughing.
It seemed such a sweet little joke.
I was certain that one fine morning
The butterfly would fly out of our plates,
Laughing the teeniest laugh in the world,
And perch on the Grandmother's lap.

photo by morguefile.com

 

Why We Tell Stories by Lisel Mueller

Because we used to have leaves
and on damp days
our muscles feel a tug,
painful now, from when roots
pulled us into the ground

and because our children believe
they can fly, an instinct retained
from when the bones in our arms
were shaped like zithers and broke
neatly under their feathers

and because before we had lungs
we knew how far it was to the bottom
as we floated open-eyed
like painted scarves through the scenery
of dreams, and because we awakened

and learned to speak

2
We sat by the fire in our caves,
and because we were poor, we made up a tale
about a treasure mountain
that would open only for us

and because we were always defeated,
we invented impossible riddles
only we could solve,
monsters only we could kill,
women who could love no one else
and because we had survived
sisters and brothers, daughters and sons,
we discovered bones that rose
from the dark earth and sang
as white birds in the trees

3
Because the story of our life
becomes our life

Because each of us tells
the same story
but tells it differently

and none of us tells it
the same way twice

Because grandmothers looking like spiders
want to enchant the children
and grandfathers need to convince us
what happened happened because of them

and though we listen only
haphazardly, with one ear,
we will begin our story
with the word and

Bobbi Miller, Nana In Training

I Love This Little Poem Because

Happy National Poetry Month! To celebrate the month (and especially National Poem in Your Pocket Day), we Teaching Authors are sharing some of our favorite pocket-sized poems.

We have a new puppy, Rosy. The other day, I heard her barking and remembered a favorite old poem I’d saved long ago. The more I think about it, the more I appreciate its clever wordplay.

Motto For a Dog 

I love this little house because
It offers after dark,
A pause for rest, a rest for paws,
A place to moor my bark. 

Arthur Guiterman

The last line always grabs me. I didn’t realize the double meaning at first: a bark is a kind of boat; of course, a dog’s bark would be moored (tied up) somewhere cozy and safe. And the pause/paws homonyms add to the poem’s genius.

I looked up Arthur Guiterman and found a Wikipedia entry plus a 1915 (!) New York Times article (read a .pdf here) in which he gives advice on how to make a living as poet. Notice the article’s author: Joyce Kilmer! According to Kilmer’s Poetry Foundation bio, he was on staff at the New York Times around then. I love discovering tidbits like that.

I keep lots of Other People’s Poems on my computer in a file labeled “Inspiration.” I turned to that file last year when I visited an elementary school on National Poem in Your Pocket Day. I printed a stack of pocket-sized poems in case anyone needed one. Most students came prepared, but some of the parents at the evening assembly were empty-pocketed, so I was glad I had extras.

Do you have an “Inspiration” file? What’s in it?

Be sure to check out our other Teaching Authors posts in this series. April started with Steven Withrow’s “What Makes a Turbine Turn” from Janet Wong and Sylvia Vardell's new anthology, The Poetry of Science: The Poetry Friday Anthology for Science for KIDS.

Mary Ann shared the moving and memorable “92” by e.e. cummings, and then April returned with a Wednesday Writing Workout about rhyming patterns in poetry.

Last year for National Poetry Month, I wrote a haiku a day. You can read all thirty poems on my web site. This year, school visits and deadlines made me decide to focus on reading more poetry. I’m happy to have so many options available! Laura Purdie Salas has this week’s Poetry Friday Roundup at Writing the World for Kids. Enjoy!

Check out Bruce Black’s interview with me at Wordswimmer.

And if you haven’t yet, please Like our Teaching Authors Facebook page!

JoAnn Early Macken

Late to the Poetry Party

Note to readers: Carmela here. If you're reading this post online, it has my name in the byline, but the post that follows is from Mary Ann. She's unable to post today due to technical difficulties, so I'm doing it for her. Enjoy! 

In honor of National Poetry Month, I am to choose “a poem I would carry in my pocket.” I still have a knee-jerk reaction to the words, “National Poetry Month.” Poetry? Bleah! (Before you get too outraged and stop reading this post, I did get over my intense dislike of poetry. Read on.)

My elementary school teachers were “old school” when it came to poetry. We had so few opportunities for creative writing, that it seemed a shame to waste any of them on poetry. Poetry had to have rhyme and meter and just the right number of syllables per line. Oh yeah, it also had to make sense. And be short. I figured anything that was worth saying took more than eight or so lines. (Eight lines was the minimum for these poetry assignments.) Too many rules, too much structure.

Of course, no one was teaching Ferlinghetti or ee cummings to fourth graders in the sixties. What we wrote had to rhyme, and preferably be about a “pretty” subject like clouds or flowers or how much we admired our teacher.

In junior high, the poetry units seemed to consist entirely of the works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Hiawatha, The Courtship of Miles Standish and my absolute, least favorite, Evangeline. Not only did we pore over every line and nuance, we were made to memorize long passages, that we regurgitated on tests. I usually did well, since memorizing is one of my “talents.” I hated every word of those poems, but I got my A. (Spoiler alert: I was particularly ticked that after seemingly hundreds of stanzas of the star-crossed lovers Evangeline and Gabriel just missing each other, over and over, they meet just in time for Gabriel to die in Evangeline’s arms. Some big emotional pay-off!)

By high school, the literature curriculum became “relevant” and suddenly the old marching line of World Lit, US Lit, British Lit were replaced with “literature electives” such as “American Theater,” “20th Century American Lit” (all the authors were male) and “Creative Writing.” There were some poetry courses on the list, but I skipped right past them. No more meter, no more rhymes. No more “thee’s” and “thou’s” and dying lovers. Yay!

Poetry did not re-enter my life until I began my MFA in Writing for Children at Vermont College. My classmates passionately discussed Mary Oliver and Donald Hall and Wendell Berry, poets I had never heard of. I would hole up in a corner of Bear Pond Books (MY “happiest place on earth”) and scan through piles of poetry books, finding poems that did NOT rhyme, and that spoke right to the heart of me. At long last, I had arrived at the poetry party.

At the time I was living in Bangkok and felt terribly isolated. As if I had drifted away from Earth and into another dimension. I lived on email, to the point that my friends no longer seemed human, only words on a computer screen.

It was then that I found E.E. Cummings’ “92”, the poem I would carry in my pocket, bring to a desert island and would recite to myself to remind me that on the other side of the world there were flesh-and-blood people who loved and cared about me.

                 "92"

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go, my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
                                                i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

---from E.E. Cummings Complete Poems 1904-1962
edited by George J. Firmage, Liveright, 1994

I am happy to announce that Chana S. is the winner of  our April’s latest picture book, More Than Enough: A Passover Story. Congratulations, Chana.

Posted by Mary Ann Rodman

Poems, Animals, and Animal Poems

I’m sorry to see National Poetry Month end. Mine went out with a bang, though, in a wonderful Family Literacy Night celebration at an elementary school in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Happily, the date coincided with Poem in Your Pocket Day.

What fun to see students so excited about poetry! To watch them proudly pull out and unfold their handwritten index cards. To hear them bravely recite their favorite poems.

I was able to narrow my own favorite poems down to eleven—quite an achievement, I think! I brought five copies of each to hand out in case anyone forgot theirs. I’m glad to say that I came home with only three poems and that many of the ones I handed out went to parents. I hope they’ll keep sharing.

On to May! For this Teaching Authors series, we’re writing about animals. Bobbi began with some favorite animal books.

For all of April (National Poetry Month), I wrote a haiku a day. (You can see the April archive on my blog.) I looked back through the poems and found that 13 of the 30 addressed animals, mostly birds. Here in Wisconsin, we see a lot of birds migrating through to summer homes at this time of year, so that seems logical. One thing I loved about the daily haiku practice is that this year, I noticed.

Here’s one more haiku from this morning. I can’t seem to stop!

Squirrel winds her way
from limb to limb, encumbered
mouth full of dry leaves

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at A Year of Reading, at least for now. Enjoy!

JoAnn Early Macken