April - Poetry Month - 2024, Day Twenty-Nine, Finding Memories

  Happy Poetry Month!

        I'm taking the advice from the poet who has given so much to help us all, including students and teachers, write poetry. I'll be moving from A to Z, obviously needing to combine a few to make it all come out to 30. FYI—Sometimes, Paul Janeczko offers a prompt to write a poem that begins with the specific alphabet letter instead of a poem type. It will be fun to be open to writing in all kinds of ways!

       You can find the path to the Progressive Poem over to the right! Simply click on the graphic!

        As you can see above, the 26 letters of the Alphabet and the words that begin with them have been covered. These final days I decided to find a few memories to write about, this time preparing for summer time!

Day 29 - Last Day Teaching

 

           It was both hard and easy to retire from teaching. I loved my work, but I knew it was time for other things and, like every year, time for a break! This poem is for my students at the end of every year and me, too, at the end.

Last photo of my desk!

Outta Here!

 

Goodbye pencils

and lined paper,

friends at recess,

game creators.

Farewell teachers, 

homework’s done.

Time to leap into our summers-

filled with fun.

 

 

Linda Baie ©  

 

It's Monday - New Wow Books - One Old Discovery

              Visit Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders and Jen at Teach Mentor Texts to see what they've been reading, along with others who post their favorites.  Your TBR lists will grow! Happy Reading!
          Share with the hashtag #IMWAYR


           I hope all of you are doing well and doing the best you can during this time. Enjoy your family and Happy Summer!

         I have a second post today, a blog tour with a giveaway! Come visit here!

          The girl in this book is in seventh grade, but at least in my area, sixth graders begin middle school. My oldest granddaughter will be starting this strangest of growing-up experiences next year. Unlike Shayla, the protagonist in Lisa Moore Ramée's debut chapter book, my granddaughter is starting in a new school knowing very few students. I wish her well in navigating this time, hope she will find courage as Shayla did.

         Twelve-year-old Shayla is allergic to trouble, so much so that when she's really upset or nervous, inside, her hands itch. She really values following the rules and is looking forward to starting seventh grade with the United Nations (her two best friends from grade school). 

         Soon enough Shay realizes that rules change when kids get older. They want to be liked, girls and boys both. Her two friends are of different backgrounds, Latina and Asian. Shayla is black. Each wants something different and in this story, that means some disagreements, perhaps even friendships broken.

          Some at school are saying she's not black enough, doesn't mix enough with her black classmates! Different boys like Shayla, but she likes other boys. Sound familiar. Young teens are trying to figure out who they are, and Shay struggles with it all, too. Teachers and the principal also play a part in her life, mostly good, but when it comes to what's really important, Shay does figure out what is most important to her, wearing an armband to school in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.

          Shay's older sister Hannah is involved in protests, but at first, as I wrote earlier, Shay really doesn't like breaking rules. She's learned from others, including her coach while doing track. And she's thinking more about what her favorite history teacher is saying, that we have to be ourselves, no matter what. 

          What I loved was reading the thoughts of this marvelous young woman that Lisa Moore Ramée has given us. If you know a young adolescent, you'll see how much they think about life and stuff, over and over again. Ramée has Shayla ending each chapter with a bit of learning, showing her grow and grow until she feels good about what happens, what she does even though it takes lots of courage. For example, Shayla says: "I never knew walking right into trouble would make me feel strong. Maybe it has to be the right type of trouble."

           It's a wonderful book that's so current, it feels as if Ramée wrote it yesterday. There are the students, the varied teachers, and the protests over another police officer getting off the hook for a shooting. It's about today!

           I was lucky to win this copy from Michele Knott's giveaway and it is terrific. Remember You Are (Not) Small? These two creatures are happily building a sandcastle when more than one creature you'll recognize from the earlier book needs to add some advice. This turns into quite an amazing structure, and a surprise! Everything 'perfect' is in the eye of the beholder, right? 

Poetry Friday - Summer Tunes

Liz Steinglass hosts this Poetry Friday, celebrating and sharing some poems in the process of the writing of her poetry book, out very soon. It's SoccerVerse! Congratulations, Liz, and thanks for hosting!







        I enjoy every April when poets come together to write for Irene Latham's Progressive Poem. You can see the latest and those of past years here. And this April, Donna Smith beautifully set the poem to music, sang and played it for us on her ukelele. And I loved the latest poem because I love summer, too, and enjoyed everyone's words of summer as intros to the lines.
         And then came SUMMER! I try hard not to take home very many books from the used bookstore where I volunteer. I help with donations on Thursday and sometimes a book appears that feels like one that's meant for me. This is one, nearly thirty years old, filled with essays and poems of summer memories, attitudes, even regrets. It is divided into three sections: The Door to Summer, When Time Was Here and Between Wild and Sheltered. Calvin Trillin writes about chiggers; Daniel Okrent shares his baseball passions in the summer at Cooley Lake (a summer retreat), and Louise Erdrich tells how her family begins summer in the winter. Each entry makes me want summer more, my beach trip, a trip to visit my brother and other relations, lazier days outside. 

        Among other poems in the book, I'm sharing this Summer Morning by Charles Simic. You can listen to him reading it here. 

I love to stay in bed
All morning,
Covers thrown off, naked,
Eyes closed, listening.

Outside they are opening
Their primers
In the little school
Of the cornfield.

There’s a smell of damp hay,
Of horses, laziness,
Summer sky and eternal life.

I know all the dark places
Where the sun hasn’t reached yet,

And see all the poem here.

       There is much to love and to choose from. Early in the book, Elizabeth Hardwick writes "The congratulation of summer is that it can make the homely and humble if not exactly beautiful, beautifully acceptable. Such brightness at midday and then the benign pastels, blues and lavenders of the summer sky. Much may wither and exhaust, but so great is the glow and greater the freedom of the season that every extreme will be accommodated."

She ends with "Summer, the season of crops. The concreteness of it. Not as perfumed and delicate and sudden as spring and not as triste as autumn. Yet, for the enjoyment of summer's pleasures, for the beach, the crowded airplane to Venice, most of us consent to work all year long."

         Summer's coming. . .

        I do love Liz's challenge last week at Michelle's Today's Little Ditty and had a poem I wrote to it, shared Thursday. So, I couldn't resist one more, Liz and Michelle, about summer!

Instructions for Summer

Blast me with your beautiful extremes:

daylight till near bedtime,

frightening thunderstorms,

a cold Independence Day.

I’ll still love you.

Paste memories in my mind:

carny tilt-a-whirls,

State Fair lambs and blue ribbons,

ice cream truck melodies.

I will remember.

Grow grand gardens for cellar jars:

tomatoes and green beans,

cucumbers and carrots,

but avoid too much zucchini.

I will love them and share.

Prepare me for autumn:

turn pumpkins orange,

drop a leaf or two,

plan with the birds.

Even ending, I’ll love you.

Linda Baie ©

Summer-almost!

Time for Tuesday's Slice of Life Sharing at Two Writing Teachers
                     Come join us!  Tweet at #SOL14
            Thanks to Stacey, Tara, Beth, Dana, Betsy and Anna for hosting such a marvelous community!

      I'm not sure if this is a slice or a book review. I began today thinking I would write about gardening and this time that meant mowing my lawn and doing a bit of weeding. Because it snowed last week, then rained, and I was away on the weekend, every green and growing thing GREW! The snow and cold didn't appear to hurt even a bud, so flowers are opening and my small bit of lawn is growing. Here are two pictures of the first iris and columbine. 

May Means Adventure Plans-now and summer, too

It's time for Slice of Life Tuesday, hosted by Ruth and Stacey at Two Writing Teachers.
     #slice2013

      It's May, the days are longer, and it is warmer, thank goodness!  I am getting ready for several adventures, one even before school ends!
      This year, through unusual circumstances, I've been asked to take over a class of upper intermediate students (mostly 5th-6th grade students).  Their core teacher is taking a new job out of school education and must leave us this early.  He is a wonderful teacher and we will miss him very much.  I am starting to be in his classroom this week for two days, and to do my real job the other three days.  In fact, when I taught the older students, he was the overnight, experiential trip teacher that helped me plan my fall and spring trips.  The very first week I'll be full time with the class is on their overnight, and it is a trip I took several years ago with this teacher and my earlier class.  Circles in life!  And it happens that his assistant was mine before I retired from the classroom.  Circles!

Still Summer...

         
Two Writing Teachers hosts a Slice of Life each Tuesday.  Please join Stacey and Ruth and the community for a wonderful time reading everyone's slices.  


        I am living my slice this week because my grandson is here visiting.  I'll share about our time and adventures together next week, but for now, it's the end of the month and time for Chalk-a-bration!  
        Betsy, at Teaching Young Writers, (whom I met during the Tuesday slices) has begun a tradition of what she calls a Chalk-a-Bration where poets write poems and chalk them for others to see.  Check out what everyone does today for this celebration.  August arrives tomorrow and with it our last summer days of some relaxing, some preparing, some "oh mys, where did the summer go?"  Here is my poem in tribute to still summer...  Thank you Betsy for your idea and for continuing it!

Pantry Stores

  It's always a pleasure to visit Poetry Friday, this week hosted by Kate Coombs at the Book Aunt!

"Oh the weather outside is frightful" and I'm still not delighted!  I’m already begrudging the winter weather, and though I might enjoy a white Christmas, I miss the warmer times.  It is cold, therefore after the new year, I will start the countdown to spring, beginning with the exciting arrival of seed catalogs.  Here is what I did before the temperature dropped:

          My Pantry Stores

I traveled all the way up to the sun,

managed to steal a little chunk away

for now it’s winter, and I am thankful

for this warm, bright ray.

I captured the humming buzz of the bees

and the wings of a dragonfly.

I plucked the petals of the flowers because

when they at last are dry

I’ll have life instead of the death

of this icy-fingered world.

And the wings will boost my spirits.

All these things I carefully swirled,

then boiled for several hours on end

to make the charmed ingredients blend.

Finally I filled tiny Mason jars

to ensure spring at my house will never end.

I’ll open only for times less bright,

and if your happiness hangs by a string

I gladly give, too, one jar to help your

winter metamorphose into spring.

Ready To Say Goodbye To Summer - Or Am I?

                               If summer has lost its glory and power, and

                               we wish hot summer weather to be gone in an hour,

                               then it must be late August and school has begun

                               taking lazy days and heated haze and some of our fun!