Celebrating - A Little At A Time

            It's Saturday, time for reflection and celebration with Ruth at her blog, Ruth Ayres Writes, Discover Play Build!

Tweet at #CelebrateLu

      This week I celebrate my spring break, a lovely and quiet week of writing and doing some cleaning out of some personal papers, oh, I have so many papers, and am doing a little at a time. Are you good at prioritizing, choosing what to do first? I am very good when I have a limited time in which to accomplish something, but when the hours stretch before me...  I read, I write, I go for a walk, all terrific things, but not always when other things need doing. 

Creating from my bookshelves

            For the last three years, Travis Jonker at his blog, 100 Scope Notes, now at School Library Journal, posts the annual book spine poetry gallery.  Poets, including me, from all over the world send him photos of their book spine poems and Travis creates a slide show of them all.  You can find it to view here.

       I decided to write a quick autobiography,  taking a cue from the book on top.  Enjoy, and write your own!  I created a new page (above) with all the poetry links.

Encyclopedia of an ordinary life

day by day
the passionate observer
a trail through leaves
girlfriends
book love
poem making
teaching with fire
side by side
hidden gems
something permanent

Another Poem of Goodbye To Childhood

    Slice of Life Is Enjoyed Every Tuesday with Stacey and Ruth at the Two Writing Teachers blog.

This is the fourth poem in my personal project about different ways of looking at children (mine, others, and grandchildren, too) growing up.  I’ve chosen to do a series of poems at different stages in children's lives, essentially saying goodbye each time.  I hope to put them together in a book with pictures of my grandchildren (10 ½, almost 3, 7 months) and children at the particular stage I am describing in the poem.  Part of this comes from my talks with my daughter and the children growing and changing so fast.  Another part is that I love telling stories through poetry, and I love poems of goodbye, so I thought this would be a good way to combine both passions.  It's nice to have a goal and an audience to write for.

Holding Moments

      Happy Easter and Passover everyone.  Each holiday we are reminded of other ones in the past, where we were, who we were with, what we used as traditions, even perhaps why we did celebrate with those traditions.  I have been more reflective lately and tonight wrote this poem because I was looking for another picture and came across an early school picture of me.  And, so I wrote.

When I gaze upon the photograph

Of me

I see

A little girl whose face just makes me smile

And pause

Because

In having lingering thoughts of years ago

I find I hold the happiest moments in tow

Those round

Eyes brown

Remind me of good events—of course don't last

But I am ever gladdened by my past.

Don't forget to check on the Poetry Tag Group shown at the right!  And look at Jama Rattigan's blog post at Jama's Alphabet Soup  to discover so many Poetry sites in the kidlitosphere doing wonderful things!  Cathy, at Merely Day By Day, is joining Mary Lee, at A Year of Reading in a poem a day this month. Other daily poem writers include Amy at The Poem Farm, and Donna at Mainely Write.

Self-Reflection

     In my teaching years, I've mostly worked with early adolescents, and one of the important parts of their lives is working out exactly who they are, who they want to be like, why they want to be like that, how does it work being that way, etc.  We had many discussions about choices and choices and even more choices.  Making good decisions for self is an important concept to consider all of one's life, and learning that one does have the power to make decisions for oneself is an epiphany for some.

Taking Some Care

Here's a question

meant for all:

Although posed

self-consciously.

Cannot I ever just be

the me 

I would rather see

than she seen by all others

surrounding 

me?  

    Also, be sure to check on the Poetry Tag Group shown at the right!  And check on Jama Rattigan's blog post at Jama's Alphabet Soup  to discover so many Poetry sites in the kidlitosphere doing wonderful things!  Cathy, at Merely Day By Day, is joining Mary Lee, at A Year of Reading in a poem a day this month. Other daily poem writers include Amy at The Poem Farm, and Donna at Mainely Write.

It's Monday Plus Poetry Month - A New Challenge!

Visit Jen and Kellee at Teach Mentor Texts for this meme where you can find oh so many ideas for children's book (YA too!), and Sheila at Book Journeys for even more.

          Because I’m challenging myself to write a poem each day in April, I am writing a poem about the books I read this past week, this time in preparation for a non-fiction poetry lesson I’m giving soon.  Here is the poem, and a bit more about the books with some parts of poems from each book.  These are all books from our school library.  I know there are many more wonderful non-fiction anthologies and hope to find some at my local library too.  My goal was to find a variety of topics so that students could feel free to access something from their personal research topic that we do at my school, or have choice of any other topic they love.

       For the poem, I began listing the titles of the poetry anthologies and added a word here and there.

                       Um-m-Poetry

It’s Monday, So, you want to know what I’ve been Reading?

Eureka!  spans history with stories in poems about inventors and

Math Talk offers mathematical ideas for two voices. Add in

an imaginary walk out of doors with

Color Me A Rhyme-nature poems for young people and then I

rush to a Seawatch.

I ramble through jungles and deserts, down creeks, into forests

in The Beauty of the Beast poems from

the animal kingdom.  I look further at tiny creatures

seeing insects flourish in

Insectlopedia

They’re a bit less noisy than Click, Rumble, Roar,

Poems about Machines.

The titles give hints, but the poems

entrance.  Just open them up,

for poetic delight.

That’s what I’ve been doing

for students. 

The Beauty of The Beast   Poems from the Animal Kingdom selected by Jack Prelutsky and illustrated by Meilo So

     The section titles are poetic themselves, with titles like Jubilant, We Swim (fish) and Hollow-Boned Singers (birds).There are clever poems all through, but my favorite is in the section titled Wrapped In Coats of Fur, one titled About Muskrat, Let’s Say…   by Isabel Joshlin Glaser

       Here is the beginning:  “You stroll along the stream

                                             To where green rushes rise

                                             And you stop beneath the willow

                                             And there, to your surprise,

                                                            A dome lies on the water,

                                              Thatched of twigs and limbs and mud.

                                              That’s the roof of Muskrat’s home.

Insectlopedia, poems and paintings by Douglas Florian

Here’s part of The Daddy Longlegs

“O Daddy

Daddy O

How’d you get

Those legs to grow

So very long

And lean in size?

Color Me A Rhyme Nature Poems for Young People by Jane Yolen with photographs by Jason Stemple

       Beautiful photos of numerous places, all color pages, like the Orange page I like.  The poem is Orange, and begins I want to take a bite out of that sunset sky.   The photo is of that amazing orange lichen on a large rock.

Eureka!  Poems about inventors  by Joyce Sidman illustrated by K. Bennett Chavez

    Be sure to find the one about inventing the chocolate bar.  The book spans history from the discovery of clay, to French balloonists, Velcro and the World Wide Web.  I adored the stories.

              Food of The Gods

In the time before memory

Quetzalcoatl—the Plumed Serpent—

dropped ripe yellow pods of cacao

into the steamy jungle.

Sea Watch poems by Jane Yolen  illustrated by Ted Lewin

See Father Seahorse

His belly pouch,

Like a Snuggli of skin,

Enfolds the eggs

Math Talk  mathematical ideas in poems for two voices  poems by theoni pappas

         This book includes lots of topics; here is the beginning of One

One

I was the first of them

The Numbers That Is                                                            The numbers that is

I was

                                                                                    The initiator.

Click, Rumble, Roar:  Poems about Machines by Lee Bennett Hopkins           

     This is the cutest book, probably for younger students.

Garbage Truck by Marci Ridlon

Hungry monster,

You grumble, wheeze,

Never seem full.

NEXT:  A friend loaned me The Lions of Little Rock by Kristin Levine so I’ll start that, and hopefully return to more reading now that I have fewer blogs to read, although it was a total pleasure!  I still need to finish Throwing Shadows by E.L. Konigsburg.  

So Who Becomes the April Fool?

        Be sure to check on the Poetry Tag Group shown at the right!  And check on Jama Rattigan's blog post at Jama's Alphabet Soup  to discover so many Poetry sites in the kidlitosphere doing wonderful things!




         It's An April Fool Kind of Day

This first of April has fooled me today;

I cannot make the words come out to play.

I’ve wished to find a clever way to make

You all enjoy a belly laugh to take

away with you to start this fabulous ride

of poets every day at every side.

But I am empty of such phrases for April’s need

And guess I’ll play the fool today –

indeed.

photo credit: Dave Hamster via photopin cc

Book Spine Poems - Exploring Our Books for Meaning - #21

     The March Slice of Life Challenge is hosted by Stacey and Ruth at their blog,

Two Writing Teachers.

Travis Jonker, at 100 Scope Notes,  continues his quest for book spine poems which he'll share during April - poetry month.  Check out the blog and see what you can create.  Here's mine!


Beware!  If you want to do it with your class, be prepared to have books all over the place, fun but messy.


It's the first day of spring, so my poem reflects the joy that it brings!