Nature writer, Hal Borland, wrote “blue sky, warm sun and roadside violets are as comforting a discovery as any heart could ask of the burgeoning countryside.” When I read this recently, it occurred to me that there are certain people who are like that, too–present and adding to the comfort of all. Mary Lee feels like that kind of person to me. Although we’ve never met, her generosity of spirit, her passions for poetry, equity, nature and teaching shine through. She is warm, welcoming and inspiring. While I am sure her absence will be keenly felt at her school, I’m looking forward to seeing where her creative energy takes her!
To celebrate all things Mary Lee in this week’s Poetry Friday, I’m re-sharing a slightly edited version of a poem I wrote to celebrate Mary Lee’s birthday several months ago.
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by another warm and generous teacher, Christie Wyman, at her blog, Wandering and Wondering. Be sure to stop by and join in the celebrations!
Last Friday was the first day of spring break and I was delighted to learn that two of my favorite poetry people, Laura Purdie Salas and Irene Latham, were presenting at the Faye B. Kaigler’s Children’s Book Festival. And it was free. And I didn’t have school, so I could attend! Win! Win! Win! Clearly, this was the best way ever to start my spring break.
It turned out that Irene and Laura were joined by the charming and amusing Vikram Madan. What a great panel of poets! Each of them shared from their books and included ideas for writing with children. If you didn’t get a chance to attend, it’s well worth the time to check out the recording here. During the presentation, among other things, Vikram shared tips for engaging kids by encouraging them to write and draw in response to humorous poems, Laura shared her riddle-ku and equation poems and Irene encouraged us to try writing nonets.
My version of a riddleku isn’t a mask poem, like Laura’s are, but here it is:
first warm spring recess pale stalks emerge pump, leap, run
Can you guess what I’m talking about? I suppose you might need to experience an early spring recess after a long northeastern winter to know. I’m leaving it title-free for now, so you can put your guess in the comments if you’d like 🙂
Here’s the nonet I started writing during Irene’s free write time and finished up later.
Nature’s Beneficence
Go! Immerse yourself in the beautiful world surrounding you. Keep your eyes wide open. Stop! Look! Listen! Breathe in. Out. Be prepared to be bedazzled. Lose yourself and find yourself again.
Thanks to Irene, Laura and Vikram for a wonderful presentation!
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by Catherine Flynn at her blog, Reading to the Core. This National Poetry Month she’s been writing a series of wonderful poems with a theme of “Writing Wild.” Be sure to check them out, along with the links to loads of other inspiring poetry projects.
I hadn’t planned to participate in PF this week, but it is the first day of April Break, so I have time. And the weather isn’t too inviting for a photo jaunt. And then I read Kat Apel’s PF post, and her breezy, fun, creative terse verse inspired me to try my own. Thanks, Kat! I had so much fun playing around with these!! What a great way to head into spring break.
Here are my efforts, in no particular order.
Spring break started yesterday: Slept in late! Feelin’ great!
On discovering hidden treasures in the garden… Violets pool. Springtime jewels.
When I see the local weather forecast on April 16th: Snow’s due. Feeling blue.
The hill of scilla has launched into riotous bloom… Dazzling hue. River of blue.
Bird vs. Cat–A sad report on recent happenings in the garden: Chirp. Slurp. Burp.
Ordered large pizzas on the commute home Tough day eaten away.
When the seamstress isn’t returning your calls about altering your mother-of-the-groom dress and the wedding is in early June… What’s the glitch? I need a stitch before the hitch!
I highly recommend reading Kat’s post and then trying your own hand at these terse verse. It’s slightly addictive!
This week’s PF Roundup is hosted by Jama at her blog, Jama’s Alphabet Soup. Jama’s posts are always a nourishing delight, so be sure to swing by and check out the happenings.
This is the first year I’m participating in the KidLit Progressive Poem. Luckily, the last week or two has been so nutty that I haven’t had too much time to stress about that. (Silver lining!) The general idea is that each participating writer sends two lines to the next poet who chooses one, then writes another two options to send on down the line. It’s been fun to follow along and watch the poem evolve.
After choosing her line from the two sent to her, this year’s Progressive Poem organizer, Margaret Simon (Reflections on the Teche) and one of her students, Chloe, each wrote an option to send my way:
Friends can be found when you open a door.
Or
A never-ending sign connects hand to hand.
Great lines, right? This decision-making is tough stuff! After hemming and hawing, I finally opted for this one: Friends can be found when you open a door.
Here’s the poem after I chose between those two options (and Margaret, you’ll have to tell me later if it’s your line or Chloe’s!):
I’m a case of kindness – come and catch me if you can! Easily contagious – sharing smiles is my plan.
I’ll spread my joy both far and wide, As a force of Nature I’ll be undenied.
Words like, “how can I help?” will bloom in the street. A new girl alone on the playground – let’s meet, let’s meet!
We can jump-skip together in a double-dutch round. Over, under, jump and wonder, touch the ground.
Friends can be found when you open a door. …?
What will the next line be? Here are my two choices for Buffy Silverman:
Hold it wide, step inside, where there’s one, there are more.
or
Side by side, let’s walk through, there’s a world to explore.
Below is the full list of participants. Feel free to go back and look at previous options and lines to see how this poem has progressed.
Here is the full list of participants for this year:
On Saturday morning, we headed toward Scarborough Downs, a former horse racing site that has been transformed into a mass vaccination site. We arrived precisely when directed for Kurt’s first vaccine dose, and were immediately impressed by the clockwork precision of the many moving parts. We were directed from station to station by friendly, helpful workers, with minimal delay.
About 10 minutes after we arrived, Kurt had received his first dose and we were walking out toward the observation area. We followed the handy white arrows on the floor as directed (or so we thought). The couple in front of us was talking to a petite older woman, so we turned toward another cluster of official looking people with clipboards.
“Hey! Are you trying to jump the line?”
We turned and saw the woman, waving her clipboard at us.
“Oops! Sorry!” we said, and moved back toward her.
The couple moved along and she turned to us.
“I may be short, you know, but I can take you down,” she asserted, smiling, and we laughed.
“Oh, are you a mixed martial artist?” asked Kurt.
“No,” she said, without missing a beat, “but I have 8 brothers.”
“Oh,” Kurt replied, “Same thing then.”
She asked her questions and directed us to the check-out/appointment scheduling area. After we finished there, the next person led us over to a couple of chairs.
“Let us know if you’re not feeling good,” she said, “You’re free to leave at 10:34 if you feel fine.”
Kurt sat, and I wandered over to check out the big thank you wall of post-its.
I wandered along the wall, stopping and reading every so often. Each note expressed thanks, gratitude and hope. Many were short. Some told personal stories. Together they created a wonderful, positive outpouring from the community. With so many serious problems front and center, it’s easy to overlook the massive accomplishments of this time, and the efforts of so many individuals and organizations to make a difference. It felt so nice to see some of that effort acknowledged here. Also, so often these days, I find I can’t begin to wrap my head around what I see people saying and doing. This communal constructive wall of thanks, though, was something I could deeply appreciate and relate to.
On the drive home, I looked ahead of us and saw this vanity plate. Even though I wasn’t the one who got this shot today, it still felt pretty apt.
Today, I grabbed a slim volume from the books in front of me. “Stone Bench in an Empty Park” is a collection of poems selected by Paul B. Janeczko. The poems are all haiku celebrating nature in the city and are beautifully illustrated with photos by Henri Silberman.
In his Introduction, Janeczko explains that while haiku usually celebrates the country, he wanted to highlight the wonders of nature within the city. He reminds us that no matter where we are, “We need to look carefully at what is around us. If we look closely enough, we will see poetry.”
I have more access to country than city around my home, and chose to write haiku about a few of the things I saw on my country walk yesterday. Next time I’m in the city though, I’ll be looking for haiku opportunities and thinking of this collection.
porcupine grazes an undulation of quills rippling through tender grass
So, here it is Day 4 and I’m still enjoying playing around with my nebulous NPM project. It occurred to me that if I’m going to keep doing this, a title or overarching theme (other than “Grabbing random books off my shelf” ) might be helpful. Maybe “Dusting off the Shelves” or “Dusting away the Cobwebs”?
Clearly, I’m going about all of this a bit backwards. Most people choose their theme or topic and then dive in. I’m dipping my toes in, happily uncommitted. As long as it feels fun and productive, I’m going to continue. As soon as it feels like a slog, I will probably opt out. If I keep going, perhaps I’ll find a title by the end of the month. 🙂
This morning, I grabbed Sandford Lyne’s book, “Writing poetry from the inside out: finding your voice through the craft of poetry” off my shelf. It’s filled with techniques, tips and writing exercises. He encourages “poem sketching”, using words as materials to create quick sketches or word studies, and suggests using word groups to get started. I’ve enjoyed playing around with these in the past and thought I’d try again today. Low stakes and fun is my mantra for the month! I turned to the back of the book, where Lyne generously provides groups of words. So many choices! I let my eyes flit over them and stopped on the first group that appealed to me this morning:
honeysuckle fence trespass taste
Here’s what I came up with:
Trespass
Honeysuckle clambers climbs up and over garden fence slow interloper roping coils of twining branches she advances trespassing with fragrant stealth betraying her presence with air that tastes of forbidden nectar
Does the pale wooden fence feel the honeysuckle’s weight as a burden? Does it resent the relentless trespass? Or does it relish the swirl of twining vine and preen beneath the sheath of blossoms, acquiring a taste for gaud and glory?
This morning I picked up Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge’s “poemcrazy,” an all-time favorite, but one I haven’t visited in years. I opened to Chapter 3: “collecting words and creating a word pool”, dove in, and fell in love with it all over again. It’s such a joyful, exuberant celebration of words and word play. I wonder that sparks don’t fly off the pages as I read.
I started writing down words and phrases, playing with sounds and meanings. Word romping. Listening for sounds, free associating, “casting out words like water in a fountain.” I drenched myself thoroughly in words, marking no boundaries, simply creating and diving into pools of words while Wooldridge cheered me on: “Be sloppy. Don’t think. You can’t make a mistake, there aren’t any wrong words.”
In April
flaming yellow finches pop in, perch, pop up like lollipops or lemon drops fling light sing bright sprinkle citrus song flit, glit, flutter, fly sparkling sunbeams in a zephyrous sky
This month Linda Mitchell posed our Swagger writing challenge: to write about something seen in many ways. The prompt was to pattern a poem after Pat Schneider’s “The Moon Ten Times,” a poem that sees the moon in many ways. I loved the way this prompt stretched my brain, and I played around with focusing on the wind, a river, winter and a tree. Ultimately, I chose to consider the many ways to see a maple tree.
Maple Tree, Ten Times
Spring reservoir sap rising like a song– sweet and clear
Wooden cradle gently rocking newborn birds
Open air venue: Dawn chorus performs
Nature’s verdant parasol
Autumn firecracker rocketing branches of crimson and gold
Calm eye in a swirl of whirligigs
Sky quilter sections the blue dome into patchwork pieces
Icy wind chime glazed limbs flash tinkle and clink
Earth’s fingers stretch trace the clouds
Winter’s needlework bold stitches anchor sky to earth
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by Mary Lee Hahn at her blog, A Year of Reading. She’s sharing a link to NPM projects and the Progressive Poem, and also the first and second poems in her NPM project of creating daily haiku.
Nix the comfort zone 