Poetry Friday: Hello from Minneapolis!

November 19, 2015November 20, 2015 Catherine Flynn3 Comments

This morning I’m in Minneapolis for NCTE’s Annual Convention. I’m looking forward to seeing poetry friends old and new at the Children’s Book Award Luncheon tomorrow, where Marilyn Singer will be honored with the Excellence in Poetry for Children Award.

Many wonderful poets live in Minnesota, so I thought it would be fun to do a mini-round up of three of my favorite poets from this beautiful state.

First up is Laura Purdie Salas. Laura has written two picture book poetry collections, and her work has appeared in many anthologies, including the stunning new National Geographic Book of Nature Poetry. Last year I had the honor of writing the activity guide for Laura’s Wacky, Wild, and Wonderful: 50 State Poems, part of her “Painless Classroom Poems” series. Laura graciously allowed me to share these poems with you today.

“Minnesota: The Birth of Old Man River”

A lake creates a lazy stream
That flows through pines and slips away,
Then picks up barges, logs, and steam,
Becomes a mighty waterway.

Walk on rocks across this sliver,
Cross the current, slow and mild.
It will grow to Old Man River
Though for now it’s still a child.

“Things to Do If You Are a Tree”
by Laura Purdie Salas

Wake up to geese honks and puddle splashes.
Grow a leafy shirt.
Hug birds’ nests and lost kittens.
Stretch toward summer sun.
Shade the backyard.
Drink plenty of rain.
Gulp nitrogen from the soil.
Eat a kite for dessert.
Dance with the wind.
Knit a scarlet fall sweater.
Drop your leaves to protect chipmunks and snakes.
Set your alarm clock for spring.
Settle in for a snowy winter sleep.

Joyce Sidman, a past recipient of NCTE’s Excellence in Poetry for Children Award, was born in Connecticut, but now calls Minnesota home. Her gorgeous picture book poetry collections have won numerous awards and honors.

“Grass”
by Joyce Sidman

I grow in places
others can’t,

where wind is high
and water scant.

I drink the rain,
I eat the sun;

before the prairie winds
I run.

Read the rest here.

Although she’s not a children’s poet, many of Joyce Sutphen‘s poems evoke the beauty of nature and are very accessible to young readers. Sutphen is currently Minnesota’s Poet Laureate.

“Some Glad Morning”
by Joyce Sutphen

One day, something very old
happened again. The green
came back to the branches,
settling like leafy birds
on the highest twigs;
the ground broke open
as dark as coffee beans.

The rest of the poem can be found here.

Please be sure to visit Tricia Stohr-Hunt’s lovely blog, The Miss Rumphius Effect, for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: Driving at Night

November 5, 2015November 5, 2015 Catherine Flynn9 Comments

Have you even gone looking for one poem and discovered a new-to-you poet in the process? That’s how I found “Driving at Night,” by Sheila Packa. I instantly fell in love with Packa’s evocation of Sunday drives. Suddenly, I was in the back seat of my mother’s Chevy, watching the world go by.

“Driving at Night
by Sheila Packa

Up north, the dashboard lights of the family car
gleam in memory, the radio
plays to itself as I drive
my father plied the highways
while my mother talked, she tried to hide
that low lilt, that Finnish brogue,
in the back seat, my sisters and I
our eyes always tied to the Big Dipper

Read the rest of the poem here.

Be sure to visit Katya Czaja at Write. Sketch. Repeat. for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: Witchcraft

October 30, 2015 Catherine Flynn9 Comments

If you read The New York Times last Sunday, it was hard to miss the fact that Stacy Schiff has a new book coming out. The Witches: Salem, 1692 (Little, Brown) published Tuesday, just in time for Halloween, “delivers an almost novelistic, thrillerlike narrative of those manic nine months,” according to Alexandra Alter.

This period in history has never interested me too much, but after reading the reviews, I’ve added this book to my “to be listened to” list. (Have to save my precious reading time for fiction and poetry!) So imagine my surprise when I found this a few days later as I was reading from The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson:

1583

Witchcraft was hung, in History,
But History and I
Find all the witchcraft that we need
Around us, every Day—

I love Dickinson’s sly use of the word “hung” and how she alludes to Mother Nature, that most mysterious witch of all.

Illustration for "The Green Forest Fairy Book" by Loretta Ellen Brady, By Alice B. Preston, 1920 (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35458) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons — Illustration for “The Green Forest Fairy Book” by Loretta Ellen Brady, By Alice B. Preston, 1920 (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35458) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Happy Halloween, everyone! Be sure to visit Jone at Check It Out for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: Oceans of Leaves

October 23, 2015March 29, 2016 Catherine Flynn9 Comments

“When we write, we should play with what pleases us,” Lester Laminack advised the audience at the Connecticut Reading Conference earlier this month. These words have been in my head as I’ve thought about what to write for Carol Varsalona’s “Finding Fall” Poetry Gallery. Once again, Carol has invited teachers, writers, and poets to contribute a seasonal poem, which she will assemble into a stunning visual gallery.

Autumn is a perennial favorite for poets, so finding a new angle is quite a challenge. Then, when I was walking my dog last week, I noticed how she sought out the piles of leaves collected along the roadside. She was having just as much fun in the leaves as I used to when I was little. I had found a topic that pleased me, a topic I could play with. Here is the result.

Oceans of Leaves

When autumn leaves transform
lawns into orange and yellow oceans,
our dog races through the piles
swelling and drifting across the yard.
Like a dolphin, diving in and out
of foamy ocean waves,
she plunges
into heaps of maple leaves
that rustle and crunch
under her sagging belly.
A smile of joy spreads across her face
as she catches the perfect wave
and rides the golden surf.

Please be sure to visit Jama Rattigan at Jama’s Alphabet Soup for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: National Geographic Book of Nature Poetry

October 15, 2015October 17, 2015 Catherine Flynn12 Comments

I treated myself to an early birthday present on Tuesday, and bought a copy of J. Patrick Lewis’s latest anthology, National Geographic Book of Nature Poetry. What a treasure! Like it’s companion volume, National Geographic Book of Animal Poetry, it is filled with stunning photographs and beautiful, evocative poetry. And it’s exciting to see the work of so many Poetry Friday regulars in this collection! Congratulations to Matt, Kelly, Charles, Mary Lee, Julie, B.J., Laura, Amy, April, and Janet! (So sorry if I missed anyone!) And what would a collection of nature poetry be without poems by Rebecca Kai Dotlich, Georgia Heard, Marilyn Singer, Naomi Shihab Nye, Jane Yolen, and more. I know I’ll be savoring this book for weeks to come.

Many classics are also included, and I was happy to see this old favorite:

“The Morns Are Meeker Than They Were”

The morns are meeker than they were,
The nuts are getting brown;
The berry’s cheek is plumper,
The rose is out of town.

The maple wears a gayer scarf;
The field a scarlet gown.
Lest I should be old-fashioned,
I’ll put a trinket on.

by Emily Dickinson

unnamed — One of our maple trees, wearing its “gayer scarf” in the morning sun.

If you haven’t gotten a copy of this gorgeous book yet, don’t delay! In the meantime, be sure to visit Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, whose wonderful poem “Petrified Forest” is included in the book, at The Poem Farm for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: “October”

October 1, 2015 Catherine Flynn8 Comments

In honor of my favorite month!

“October”
by John Updike

The month is amber,

Gold, and brown.

Blue ghosts of smoke

Float through the town.

Great V’s of geese

Honk overhead,

And maples turn

A fiery red.

Frost bites the lawn.

The stars are slits

In a black cat’s eye

Before she spits.

At last, small witches,

Goblins, hags,

And pirates armed

With paper bags,

Their costumes hinged

On safety pins,

Go haunt a night

Of pumpkin grins.

I found my copy of this book at a library book sale years ago, and it was immediately a favorite. Updike’s verses capture the essence of each month in terms children can still relate to, fifty years later. Maria Papova has written about this book and Trina Schart Hyman’s 1999 illustrations on Brain Pickings. There are also poems for several different months included in Papova’s post.

Please be sure to visit Heidi Mordhorst at My Juicy Little Universe for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: Channeling Eve Merriam

September 18, 2015June 28, 2018 Catherine Flynn9 Comments

Reply to the Question:
“How Can You Become a Poet?”
(After Eve Merriam)

Sit by a crackling fire
under a star-filled sky,
the air alive
with the song of crickets
and tree frogs
thrumming and trilling

idgit idgit
idgit idgit
idgit idgit

Let their music seep
into your soul.

Study the flames,
leaping and licking
at a teepee of logs,
illuminating the night.

Be dazzled
by sparks,
orange fireflies
dancing and swirling,
tracing a glowing trail
as they race toward the heavens.

Poets often talk about finding the right form as being the key to unlocking a poem. This is true for this draft. I jotted notes and images for this poem two weeks ago. Since then, I’ve been carrying them around with me, talking myself through different combinations of words and order of lines, but nothing satisfied me. Then, as I was looking for another poem in Mary Ann Hoberman’s outstanding collection, The Tree That Time Built, I came across Eve Merriam’s
“Reply to the Question: ‘How Can You Become a Poet?’” I immediately recognized Merriam’s free verse examination of a leaf as a potential model for my campfire images. The original, which you can read on many websites and blogs, is focused on a single object, whereas I’m trying to capture an experience. Here is a link to Heidi Mordhorst’s post about how Merriam’s poem nicely illustrates the connection between poetry and science.

Indrajit Das [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC BY 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) or CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons — Indrajit Das [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html), CC BY 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) or CC BY-SA 4.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

Please be sure to visit Michelle at Today’s Little Ditty for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: Keith Urban & Where I’m From

September 10, 2015 Catherine Flynn10 Comments

In August I was lucky to attend a Reading Institute at Teachers College Reading and Writing Project. This week-long institute is reinvigorating and energizing, and my brain is always bursting with ideas when I leave.

The staff developers at TCRWP do a terrific job of incorporating songs, videos, and other digital texts into their lessons to both engage students and broaden their horizons. I don’t watch much TV or listen to popular music on a regular basis, so I’m often out of the loop on what kids are watching and listening to. But after leaving New York, I was inspired to change the station on my way to work and listen to a country music radio station. Keith Urban’s new song, “John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16” (written by Shane McAnally, Ross Copperman, and Josh Osborne) was playing. I was drawn in by the melody right away, and the lyrics really intrigued me.

I’m a 45 spinning on an old Victrola
I’m a two strike swinger, I’m a Pepsi cola
I’m a blue jean quarterback saying “I love you” to the prom queen in a Chevy…

Read the rest of the lyrics here.

Then my teacher brain kicked in and all sorts of possibilities for sharing this song with older students started swirling in my brain. The song evokes a bygone era and offers endless opportunities for building knowledge about the culture of mid-twentieth century America.

I was also reminded of George Ella Lyon’s poem, “Where I’m From.” Popular in writing workshops as a mentor poem, many teachers begin the school year with this poem as a way to learn about their students and build community. Pairing Urban’s rendition of “John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16” with Lyon’s poem is a sure way to inspire young poets to pen their own poetic memoir.

“Where I’m From”
by George Ella Lyon

I am from clothespins,
from Clorox and carbon-tetrachloride.
I am from the dirt under the back porch.
(Black, glistening,
it tasted like beets.)
I am from the forsythia bush
the Dutch elm
whose long-gone limbs I remember
as if they were my own.

Read the rest of the poem here.

Be sure to visit Robyn Hood Black at Life on the Deckle Edge for the Poetry Friday Round Up.

Poetry Friday: Musée Des Beaux Arts

September 3, 2015 Catherine Flynn4 Comments

Musée Des Beaux Arts
by W. H. Auden

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters: how well they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking
dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer’s horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Breughel’s Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Pieter Brueghel the Elder (1526/1530–1569) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Please visit Linda at Teacher Dance for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

Poetry Friday: Missing You

August 27, 2015 Catherine Flynn15 Comments

Missing you,
the star
at the center of their universe,
the cats wander the apartment,
their orbit thrown off kilter
by your sudden departure.

They sniff the rug,
the sofa cushions
wondering,
“Where is she?”
“Did she sit here a minute ago?”

They wrap around my legs,
seeking, searching.
They nibble at their food,
lap up water with their rough,
pink tongues that long to kiss
your beautiful face,
then meander back to the bedroom,
hoping to find you
waiting there,
where you belong.

Thank you, everyone, for your all your kind words and understanding last week. My daughter-in-law Julia was a beautiful woman who will be dearly missed by everyone who knew her.

julia-alex-bklyn 2 — Julia Bean 1982-2015

Please visit Sylvia at Poetry for Children for the Poetry Friday Roundup.

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