3 Discoveries for Poetry Month!

Howdy, Campers ~ and Happy Poetry Friday! (poems and link to PF below)

Hello, hello, on this glorious first week of Poetry Month ~ I have a shower of 3 poetry discoveries just for you!

My 1st Poetry Discovery:

On October 3, 2024, Carmela's post was about a new poetry anthology, Clara's Kooky Compendium of Thimblethoughts and Wonderfuzz edited by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong and illustrated by Frank Ramspott (Pomelo Books). Her post, which you'll find here, is worth reading. (Full disclosure: both Carmela and I are proud to have poems in this collection).

The BREAKING NEWS is now, there's a companion to Clara's...called MY Kooky Compendium. It's a guided journal (blank book) with illustrations to inspire 8-13-year-old thimblethinkers and wonderfuzzers.

Read Sylvia's March 21st LET'S GET KOOKY! post about the companion book here--and make sure you watch the 1-minute not-to-be-missed video about it (which is filled Janet and Sylvia's good humor and lots of animations) at the end of her post. Now, go to Pomelo Books for more info and to order both the original Clara’s (long title--you know it by now) and its new companion, MY Kooky Compendium of Thimblethoughts and Wonderfuzz.

My 2nd Poetry Discovery:

I've just finished my first year of a 3-year term on NCTE's Poetry Awards Committee ~ and man-oh-man! was THAT an experience! At the beginning, as the books came to our doorstep, it felt just like Christmas (says the Jewish girl): OMG--a present almost every day! But within a few months, it felt like The Sorcerer's Apprentice (the familiar theme begins about 2 minutes in this 10 minute performance), when I was screaming: PLEEEEEEASE! NO MORE! 

After just a month or three, there was (literally) no room in my office. Soon, the books took over shelves in our guest room...and then they crept onto the floor of the guest closet, and more and more and more and more! I'm a s-l-o-w reader. All I can say is this first year was like climbing Mt Everest. I escaped with my life, and I sure learned a ton! I wish I had had the courage to apply for this committee decades ago. It definitely would have made me a better teacher. So...thanks, Janet, for insisting I apply to this committee. I will never forgive you...and I'm forever in your debt.

And now, drum roll, please: here are this year's NCTE outstanding poetry picture books and verse novels...and here's the marvelous NCTE Poet of the Year we chose. 

My 3rd Poetry Discovery:

Here's a poetry prompt I heard listening to Highlights Foundation's webinar on April 1st, featuring Charles Waters and Irene Latham leading Highlights Foundation's first-ever National Poetry Month Celebration, showcasing their new poetry collection for children, IF I COULD CHOOSE A BEST DAY. In addition to Charles and Irene, JaNay Brown-Wood, Lacresha Berry and Jolene Gutiérrez What a great group!

Here's one poetry prompt that stole my heart: (Irene, could you remind me who shared this prompt?)

List 10 things you can't live without.
Cross out all but 5 of them.
Cross out all but 3 of them.
Cross out all but 1 of them.

Now, write a poem about that.

I tried it...and here's a rough draft of my first effort: 

JUST ONE by April Halprin Wayland

If I had to choose
just one thing,
it would be you, dear one.

Not to butter you up,
but I dream of you,
I do.

I dream of how tender,
how warm,
how sweet you are

in all your purple finery.
Please forgive me
for putting you

in the microwave.
..................... 

Here is my initial list (in no order):

1. purple potatoes ~ you’ve got to watch this 2.3 minute video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ye21IDArJP
2. poetry
3. my husband
4. our son and daughter-in-law (yeah, it's cheating, but they come in one package)
5. my friend Bruce and his wife (Bruce and I have been writing a poem a day to each other since 2010)
6. my sister and her husband
7. my sister’s husband children and grandkiddos (yeah, that's seriously cheating...)
8. Sadie
9. Kitty
10. our baby tortoises, Meredith and Derek

Try it! I'd love to hear what you come up with. It sure will be fun to teach!

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

 

drawings and poems (c) April Halprin Wayland. All rights reserved.
posted by April Halprin Wayland
with help from Sadie & Kitty, who I apparently bored to sleep

Celebrating a New Anthology Featuring Poems by Two TeachingAuthors!

Our current TeachingAuthors topic is "Something New I Learned and Can’t Wait to Share." I've been learning lots of things this year and am pleased to share a few with you today! You'll also find a link to this week's Poetry Friday roundup at the end of this post.

I'm especially pleased to announce that today we're celebrating this week's release of Clara's Kooky Compendium of Thimblethoughts and Wonderfuzz edited by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong and illustrated by Frank Ramspott (Pomelo Books).

This new anthology includes poems by me and my fellow TeachingAuthor, April Halprin Wayland. I include samples of our poems below. But first, here's a bit about this amazing new book for grades 3 and up. Clara's Kooky Compendium is a "fun-filled journal-style book featuring a mixture of dandy doodles and drawings, fun facts, quirky questions, and 150+ poems that will get your kids giggling and guffawing while they learn about language arts, science, math, research skills, writing techniques, and more." No wonder the book has been named a Children's Book Council "Hot Off the Press" Selection for October 2024! You can see the list of the over 100 poets who contributed to the anthology on the Pomelo Books website. That page also includes printable activity sheets to go with the book. (While you're there, you may notice that a portion of the profits from this book will be donated to charities that bring joy to children in hospitals.) If you'd like to learn even more about this anthology, watch this video from Pomelo Books posted on Twitter/X.

I am honored to have two poems in Clara's Kooky Compendium, both of which came out of a course I took with Sylvia and Janet on Writing Humorous Poetry. In that course, I learned that a poem doesn't always have to make the reader laugh out loud to be humorous. Instead, it can employ rhyme, repetition, sounds, wordplay, etc., to simply invoke a smile. And when Sylvia sent me the final images of my poems in the book, I also learned how much art can add to the fun! You can see that for yourself from the page featuring my poem "Pasta"!  

I even learned something from the Thimblethought that accompanies my poem--I had no idea the first U.S. pasta factory was built by a Frenchman! My other poem in the anthology is also in free verse, but it's quite different from this one. You'll have to get the book to read it for yourself, but I'll tease you with two facts about it: The poem is called "Invention" and it's related to math.

My fellow TeachingAuthor April Halprin Wayland also has two poems in the Compendium. Here's the first one, called "Errand Dog:"

Don't you just love April's poem? Her second poem is also about a dog, but again, you'll have to get a copy of the book and read it for yourself.

Just this week, I also learned that April has a poem in another anthology that released on October 1: The Mistakes That Made Us: Confessions from Twenty Poets edited by Irene Latham and Charles Waters and illustrated by Mercè López (Carolrhoda Books). Congratulations, April!

I'm looking forward to learning a lot more from the posts in this week's Poetry Friday roundup hosted by Tabatha Yeatts at The Opposite of Indifference

Happy Writing!
Carmela

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.

Poets included:  KathiAppelt, Jorge Argueta, Brod Bagert, Carmen T. Bernier-Grand, Jen Bryant, Shirley Smith Duke, Margarita Engle, Nancy Bo Flood, David L. Harrison, Juan Felipe Herrera, EricOde, Guadalupe Garcia McCall, Ann Whitford Paul, Greg Pincus, BobRaczka, Laura Shovan, Elizabeth Steinglass, Holly Thompson, Sylvia Vardell, April Halprin Wayland and Janet Wong. Wow, right?

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