A poem moment

I went to a funeral this week. A good friend’s elderly mother passed away, at age 89, peacefully in her sleep on Sunday morning, surrounded by her family. At her funeral, her oldest son (my good friend) spoke briefly about her life and ended his eulogy with a poem. I’ve written before about how lovely and significant I think it is that we turn to poetry at such times, so it was special to see this occur. But I was even more touched and surprised when he prefaced his reading with a note that his mom had chosen this poetry when she was in sixth grade (in 1932), memorized it, and performed it so successfully, that her teacher took her around the school to show off. That stuck with her throughout her life and she recited the poem (and many other things from memory) even in her 80’s. Her son apologized in advance for any stumbling over the words, and then read this classic poem by Eugene Field out loud (it was also printed on the back of the small funeral “program.”)

The Fate of the Flimflam
by Eugene Field

A flimflam flopped from a fillamaloo,
Where the pollywog pinkled so pale,
And the pipkin piped a petulant "pooh"
To the garrulous gawp of the gale.
"Oh,woe to the swap of the sweeping swipe
That booms on the bobbling bay!"
Snickered the snark to the snoozing snipe
That lurked where the lamprey lay.

The gluglug glinked in the glimmering gloam,
Where the buzbuz bumbled his bee-
When the flimflam flitted, all flecked with foam,
From the sozzling and succulent sea.
"Oh, swither the swipe, with its sweltering sweep!"
She swore as she swayed in a swoon,
And a doleful dank dumped over the deep,
To the lay of the limpid loon!

[Also available here.]

I was familiar with Field and his most famous poem, "Wynken, Blynken, and Nod,” but I had never encountered “The Fate of the Flimflam.” Fun! (So Jabberwocky-ish! I wonder which one came first? Must check that!) And the whole crowd was tickled at this moment in an otherwise serious service.

I'm not a big fan of forced memorization, but love it when it happens naturally-- when a child chooses a poem to treasure, or simple repetition just engraves a poem on your memory. And I absolutely love that a poem from childhood has been a source of lifelong joy and comfort for nearly 90 years for Leona Lawson-- and for so many. I wish that for every child. That's what keeps me and my blog going.

For more poetry serendipity, join the Poetry Friday group at Critique de Mr. Chompchomp.

Posting (not poem) by Sylvia M. Vardell © 2009. All rights reserved.

Image credit: www.museumstorechildrensbooksonline.org

More Poems for Your Pockets

Tomorrow is “Poem in Your Pocket Day,” the second national celebration urging us to keep poems handy and ready to read and share at a moment’s notice. What a great idea! And what a great title for a collection of poetry—and for a sequel.

Poet and anthologist Bobbi Katz, has just such a gem out this spring with More Pocket Poems (Dutton, 2009) illustrated by Deborah Zemke. It’s a follow up to her popular Pocket Poems (Dutton, 2004) illustrated by Marilyn Hafner, and an equally appealing compilation of classic and contemporary poems.

A spacious Table of Contents sets the stage for introducing the 44 poems contained in this inviting picture book anthology. You’ll find old friends by Emily Dickinson and Ogden Nash excerpted to their crystalline core alongside newbies like Jorge Torres. Nice cultural mix, too.

I particularly like how the poetry begins with spring (and a “pocket” poem) and then proceeds through the calendar year; so you can start tomorrow and keep going throughout the months and seasons ahead, poem by poem. What a fun way to capitalize on the enthusiasm for National Poetry Month, too.

The art by Deborah Zemke is so appealing with watercolor images focusing on children at play. It’s reminiscent of Arnold Lobel’s illustrations for Jack Prelutsky’s classic Random House Book of Poetry, with scenes and cartoons kids that play across the pages telling small visual stories.

The first poem in the collection sets the stage—and I have permission from Bobbi herself to share it here.

Put the World in Your Pocket
by Bobbi Katz

Pockets are nifty
for holding a quarter,
for holding a key,
or for holding a shell.
But the world is full of many more things
that don’t fit in pockets so very well:
You can’t put spring in a pocket—
not summer,
not winter,
not fall.
How could you pocket a giggle?
An elephant won’t fit at all!
Yet you can carry a sunset,
people, the sea, or a home
neatly tucked inside a pocket
when they’re tucked inside a poem.

Used with permission, copyright Bobbi Katz 2009
Katz, Bobbi. 2009. More Pocket Poems. Ill. by Deborah Zemke. New York: Dutton, p.1.

Kids will love this musical and memorizable assortment of poems. They’re particularly short and pithy and great for performing, especially with movement or simple props (quarter, key, shell). In the final “Note” at the back of the book Katz hopes that kids will “recognize bits of themselves and their world captured and made manifest by brief poems” and I believe the answer will be an enthusiastic, “YES!”

Image credit: www.bobbikatz.com

Posting (not poem) by Sylvia M. Vardell © 2009. All rights reserved.

A spring manga-ish poetry mash up

Ivy in Bloom written by Vanita Oelschlager and illustrated by by Kristin Blackwood (Vanitabooks, 2009)

I happened upon this book at the ALA Midwinter conference and just got the published copy in the mail this week (after poring over the galleys earlier). It’s a poetry book published by a small press focused on books for kids ages 4-8. Vanita Books are authored and published by Vanita Oelschlager and all profits are donated to charitable organizations. An impressive venture!

But I was particularly struck by the concept for and execution of this particular title. Essentially, it’s a “mash up” of lines from famous works of fiction and poetry by classic writers. The lines are loosely woven together to express a young girl’s feelings about the coming of spring. Each line or phrase serves as a kind of caption for double-page spreads of winter-into-springtime scenes. What a clever idea! Use a line from Wordsworth here, Dickinson there, and Whitman and Milne, and voila, a picture book emerges. I wish I had thought of that! But kids (particularly older kids and teens) might find that a compelling notion for creating their own “mash ups” of classic lines, “double, double, toil and trouble… a poem lovely as a tree… quoth the raven, nevermore…”

Next, the art is an interesting counterpoint to these classic lines. Blackwood (the illustrator) notes the “mash up” of artistic techniques she employed. She begins with traditional linoleum block prints in black ink. Then those images are digitized and watercolor layers are added via computer. The overall effect is very graphic with a strong, nearly overpowering black line throughout the art. I liked that it made the book less “sweet” and more dramatic. I thought the art had a nearly “manga” look with its young girl protagonist with huge eyes and long flowing black hair. If this were a slide show or short film instead of a picture book, I would say this is ready-made for tweens and teens!

Finally, the icing on the cake, is a “bibliography” section of six pages with thumbnails of each previous picture accompanied by the full text of the poem from which the lines are derived—with the selected lines in green. A note about the poet is also included. LOVE THAT! It does reveal some rather idiosyncratic choices in mining the words and phrases for the picture book text, but that might lead to an interesting discussion with kids, too.

All in all, it’s a real departure for a poem picture book—weaving together an homage to classic poetry to celebrate the season of spring with art that is quirky and inviting. Check it out!

Obviously, there isn’t a single poem to highlight as an example, but this sample page is my favorite. (It feels very Robert Frost meets Mary Azarian!)










Oelschlager, Vanita. 2009. Ivy in Bloom. Ill. by Kristin Blackwood. Akron, OH: Vanitabooks.

Join the whole Poetry Friday crowd at my former student and current colleague’s amazing blog, Beck’s Book Reviews.

Image credit:www.thechildrensbookreview.com

Posting (not poem) by Sylvia M. Vardell © 2009. All rights reserved.

Another Hughes gem

It was amazing to me to learn that Langston Hughes was 18 when he composed the poem, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” the text for this new poem picture book illustrated by E. B. Lewis.

18!

Here is another classic Langston Hughes poem adapted into picture book form, this time with luscious watercolor illustrations by E. B. Lewis. Gorgeous landscape and portrait paintings appear in 13 double-page spreads, with one line (or half line) of the poem accompanying each of these panel illustrations. Each scene is its own strong mini-poster—classically beautiful and full of light.

The art has a very contemporary feel, except for the image of Lincoln and the final page suggesting a Black spirit ancestor. In the “Illustrator’s Note,” Lewis writes that as he worked on this book, “Hughes’s work became as personal as a prayer.”

He goes on to say, “Water has played a powerful role in the lives of black people…. In many ways, my life is like this poem: water almost ended my life; but now, through my watercolors, it has cultivated the spring of it.” He even places an image of himself praying, with the river embracing him, accompanied by the words, “My soul has grown deep like the rivers.” This image is repeated on the back of the dust jacket. Many people much smarter than I am have written about the possible meanings and interpretations of Hughes’s words, and Lewis offers a visual story that is full of emotion and heart.

The full text of the poem also appears on a single page at the end of the book. As an added bonus, look for the audio recording of Hughes himself reading this poem available online here. He even speaks briefly about the backstory behind the writing of this poem.

Sharing this wonderful work with kids will lead to many discussions—about the poem’s meaning, the symbolism of the river, the many places cited, the history of African and African American peoples, and even the use of the word, “Negro.” Teen readers may be inspired to write (or paint) their own poetic visions-- just like Hughes did when he was a teenager (and beyond)!

Hughes, Langston. 2009. The Negro Speaks of Rivers. Ill. by E. B. Lewis. New York: Disney-Hyperion.

Image credit: search.barnesandnoble.com

My People by Hughes and Smith

Close your eyes and imagine yourself in a darkened theater. All is quiet as the audience waits for the current to rise. As it does, a spotlight falls first on one face, then another. A voice rises from afar, slowly intoning the words of Langston Hughes’s classic poem, “My People” as a beautiful variety of people pause, then move across the stage. That’s how Charles R. Smith Jr.’s picture book interpretation of this beloved poem (published by Simon & Schuster, 2009) looks and feels.

An inky black backdrop sets the stage for each page, as sepia-toned close-up photographs of hands, faces, smiles, eyes, and bodies people each page. Blocked images of faces on the endpapers and in filmstrip-like stripes along the edges of the pages here and there add to the cinematic feel of the book. In his note at the end of the book, Smith writes that he wanted to show differing ages and shades of Black people; to show skin color “as bright as the sun and as dark as the night”… “the newness of a newborn smile and the wisdom of wrinkled skin.”

Each double-page spread features one or two or three words of the 33-word poem, in a super-big font. It helps s l o w the poem down for greater visual impact. I’ve heard author and artist Ashley Bryan recite this poem from memory many times, and I can imagine his booming voice saying these words as I turn the pages.

You can find the complete text of the poem in several places, including here and an audio recording read by Langston Hughes himself produced by Caedmon Audio and in the Random House “Voice of the Poet” audio series.

When my children were very young they LOVED close up photographs of babies and big images of faces. I even created simple photo-illustrated “board” books of faces for them (including their own faces) before these kinds of books were readily available. The illustrator, Charles R. Smith, Jr. has an excellent page of kid-friendly activities for experimenting with photography on his information-rich Web site, too. As a side note, check out his photo-interpretation of the classic Kipling poem, If, also in picture book form (and also a Ginee Seo Book; Atheneum/Simon & Schuster, 2007).

I can see kids using the book as a kind of script for performing the poem, focusing on faces and simple movements. I can see kids creating a mural of faces and words combined to reinterpret the poem. I can see kids choosing other Langston Hughes poems, such as “I, Too” or any of the “Dream” poems to interpret visually through photographs or collages creating their own original picture books. What an inspiring and elegant model Smith has created for this poetic “study in simplicity” reminding us that Black people—indeed ALL people—come in “all shapes, sizes, shades, and ages.”

Join our Poetry Friday host, Carol Wilcox at Carol's Corner.

Image credit: http://www.charlesrsmithjr.com/

Poetry of 2009 + Jean Little's Birthday

For this first posting of the new year, I thought I’d play “Janus” and look forward to the new poetry we can anticipate in 2009, since my last posting was a look back at all the poetry of 2008. I’ve been seeing several glimpses, with advance copies, publisher catalogs, emails, etc., and I’m very excited about what’s coming: a new Florian creation (on dinosaurs!), several Langston Hughes poem celebrations, something from Children’s Poet Laureate, Mary Ann Hoberman, a poem-a-day book by J. Pat Lewis, some poetry about work, animals, nature, and plenty of humor! Here’s the first list of the year! MUCH more to come…

Poetry Books Coming in 2009
1. Agee, Jon. 2009. Orangutan Tongs; Poems to Tangle Your Tongue. New York: Disney-Hyperion.
2. Florian, Douglas. 2009. Dinothesaurus. New York: Simon & Schuster.
3. Foxworthy, Jeff. 2009. Silly Street. Illus. by Steve Bjorkman. New York: HarperCollins.
4. Heard, Georgia. 2009. Falling Down the Page; A Book of List Poems. New York: Roaring Brook Press.
5. Hoberman, Mary Ann. 2009. All Kinds of Families. New York: Little, Brown.
6. Hopkins, Lee Bennett. 2009. City I Love. Ill. by Marcellus Hall. New York: Abrams.
7. Hopkins, Lee Bennett. 2009. Incredible Inventions. Illus. by Julia Sarcone-Roach. New York: HarperCollins.
8. Hopkins, Lee Bennett. 2009. Sky Magic. Ill. by Mariusz Stawarski. New York: Dutton.
9. Hughes, Langston. 2009. My People. Ill. by Charles R Smith Jr. New York: Simon & Schuster.
10. Hughes, Langston. 2009. The Negro Speaks of Rivers. Ill. by E. B. Lewis. New York: Disney-Hyperion.
11. Iyengar, Malathi Michelle. 2009. Tan to Tamarind: Poems About the Color Brown. Illus. by Jamel Akib. San Francisco, CA: Children’s Book Press.
12. Katz, Alan. 2009. Going, Going, Gone!: And Other Silly Dilly Sports Songs. New York: Simon & Schuster.
13. Lewis, J. Patrick. 2009. Countdown to Summer: A Poem for Every Day of the School Year. Ill. by Ethan Long. New York: Little Brown.
14. Lewis, J. Patrick. 2009. Skywriting: Poems in Flight. Ill. by Laszlo Kubinui. Minneapolis, MN: Creative Editions.
15. Lewis, J. Patrick. 2009. Spot the Plot! A Riddle Book of Book Riddles. Ill. by Lynn Munsinger. San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books.
16. Lewis, J. Patrick. 2009. The Underwear Salesman: And Other Jobs for Better or Verse. Ill. by Serge Bloch. New York: Simon & Schuster/Atheneum.
17. Nesbitt, Kenn. 2009. My Hippo Has the Hiccups with CD: And Other Poems I Totally Made Up. Naperville, IL: Sourcebooks.
18. Paul, Ann Whitford. 2009. Word Builder. New York: Simon & Schuster.
19. Ruddell, Deborah. 2009. A Whiff of Pine, A Hint of Skunk. New York: Simon & Schuster.
20. Sidman, Joyce. 2009. Red Sings from Treetops; A Year in Colors. Illus. by Pamela Zagarenski. New York: Harcourt Houghton Mifflin.
21. Weinstock, Robert. 2009. Food Hates You, Too. New York: Disney-Hyperion.
22. Wilson, Karma. 2009. What's the Weather Inside? New York: Simon & Schuster.
23. Wolff, Virginia Euwer. 2009. This Full House. Harper Teen/The Bowen Press.
24. Zimmer, Tracie Vaughn. 2009. Steady Hands: Poems About Work. New York: Clarion.

ABOUT POETS AND POETRY
Dana, Barbara. 2009. A Voice of Her Own; Becoming Emily Dickinson. New York: HarperCollins.
Dotlich, Rebecca Kai. Bella & Bean. New York: Simon & Schuster.

+ Poet Birthday Today! Today is also Canadian author and poet Jean Little’s birthday. Blind from birth, many of her works focus on characters with disabilities. I remember reading her first book, Mine for Keeps (1962) about a girl who had cerebral palsy, when I was a little girl and I just loved it! Jean Little is known primarily for writing fiction, but has one book, in particular, that blends fictional vignettes and poetry from the point of view of a spunky ‘tween that is wonderful-- It’s Hey World, Here I Am! One of my favorite poems about poetry is from this book. It’s cranky and hilarious and captures a moment that many of us may have experienced!

After English Class
By Jean Little

I used to like “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.”
I liked the coming darkness,
The jingle of harness bells,
Breaking—and adding to—the stillness,
The gentle drift of the snow . . .

But today, the teacher told us what everything stood for.
The woods, the horse, the miles to go, the sleep—
They all have “hidden meanings.”

It’s grown so complicated now that,
Next time I drive by,
I don’t think I’ll bother to stop.

From: Little, Jean. 1989. Hey World, Here I Am! New York: Harper & Row.

Start the year off right with Poetry Friday, hosted this week by A Year of Reading.

Image credits: childrensbooks.about.com;www.minervaclassics.com

Emily Dickinson on hurricanes

I recently decided to keep a book of poetry in my purse for those moments when you find yourself waiting with nothing to do. Since I’ve been trying to lighten the load in my bag (due to shoulder issues), I was pleased to find a tiny volume of a handful of Emily Dickinson’s poems (one of my favorite of the classic poets) at Half Price Books. It’s been fun to read and think through a poem here and there. Waiting with a poem is a pleasurable way to pass a few minutes—sort of a mental yoga—and I highly recommend it. And it’s been interesting to revisit some old favorites and even discover some Dickinson gems that I had missed along the way.

For example, I had no idea that she had written about a storm—what some people claim might have been a hurricane.







There came a wind like a bugle;
It quivered through the grass,
And a green chill upon the heat
So ominous did pass
We barred the windows and the doors
As from an emerald ghost;
The doom’s electric moccasin
That very instant passed.
On a strange mob of panting trees,
And fences fled away,
And rivers where the houses ran
Those looked that lived—that Day—
The bell within the steeple wild
The flying tidings whirled.
How much can come
And much can go,
And yet abide the world!

From Moore, Geoffrey. Ed. 1986. Great American Poets: Emily Dickinson. New York: Clarkson N. Potter Publishers, p. 54.

We here in Texas are coping with the “emerald ghost” of Hurricane Ike this weekend, so this poem goes out to my friends and colleagues and all those in the Houston-Galveston area. Hang in there!

Picture credit: www.sciam.com

Happy birthday, Langston

Today is Langston Hughes birthday, Feb. 1, 1902. Boy, I love this man’s poetry. It speaks to me on so many levels and resonates with readers and listeners of all ages and cultures. His collection, The Dream Keeper and Other Poems, is a staple of my poetry library and I refer to it often. (I chose it as one of “Fifteen Classics of Contemporary Poetry for Children” in my Book Links article in 2006; 15, (6), 12-15.) In fact, it was just reissued in a 75th anniversary edition (as I noted Dec. 31, 2007, in My favorite poetry books of 2007.) As I pored over previous blog postings to be sure I didn’t repeat myself, I realized that I refer to Hughes and his work often!

I wrote about his moving “Poem” (I loved my friend./He went away from me) last Sept. 21, 2007, and mentioned his work in my July 24, 2006 posting on “Multicultural Poetry” and my April 14, 2007 posting on Dream Day and my April 17, 2007 posting on the tragedy at Virginia Tech. Last year (Jan. 24), we celebrated Coretta Scott King Illustrator honors for Poetry for Young People: Langston Hughes edited by David Roessel and Arnold Rampersad, illustrated by Benny Andrews (published by Sterling Publishing) and also highlighted Carol of the Brown King: Nativity Poems illustrated by Ashley Bryan (Dec. 22, 2006).

So, for a change, I’d like to pay tribute to Hughes’s life and work with a poem by someone else—Walter Dean Myers, a man who clearly stands on Langston Hughes’s shoulders. This poem is in the voice of a Harlem salesman and comes from Myers’s amazing multi-voiced photo-illustrated, Here in Harlem: Poems in Many Voices (Holiday House, 2004).

Jesse Craig, 38
Salesman
by Walter Dean Myers

I knew Langston
Laughed with the man

In West Harlem
With me thinking

This is no Keats
No fair Shelley

This is Negro
Quintessential

Rice and collards
Down-home brother

He knew rivers
And rent-due blues

And what it meant
To poet Black

The Academy of American Poets is rich with additional information about Hughes and his work, including teaching resources and sample poems. There’s a wonderful audio clip from “The Voice of Langston Hughes” (by Folkways Records) of his reading of his poem, “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” written in 1920, just after he graduated from high school! Additional audio (and more) can be found at the Langston Hughes Young Writers Project, including poems with musical accompaniment or translated into Spanish!

Thanks to Karen Edmisten for this week's Poetry Friday Round Up.

P.S. New: I’m honored to be linked to the Web site of Book Links as one of their new “Featured Blogs.”

Picture credit: concise.britannica.com

Remembering Robert

I had the opportunity to meet the talented and effervescent author and illustrator Grace Lin this spring when we were on a panel together at the Texas Library Association conference. Her husband, Robert Mercer, was desperately ill and sadly passed away a month ago at the too-young age of 35. My good friend Nancy also lost her husband to cancer this summer. Grief has been weighing on many I care about recently, so I sought a poem for solace, of course.


Poem
by Langston Hughes

I loved my friend.
He went away from me.
There’s nothing more to say.
The poem ends,
Soft as it began—
I loved my friend.

Hughes, Langston. 1994. The Dreamkeeper and Other Poems. New York: Knopf, p. 12.

I would also like to join in the promotion of Robert’s Snow: For Cancer’s Cure, the fundraising effort that Grace initiated several years ago. From the Web site: “Own a piece of art from your favorite children's book illustrator while helping to fight cancer” by buying an original snowflake ornament created by children’s book illustrators. “Since 2004, this online auction has raised over $200,000 for Dana-Farber, and with your help, we can continue this holiday tradition in 2007.” The auction begins in November. And for more information about Robert himself, check out the Blue Rose Girls blog.

For the whole Poetry Friday roundup, go to Sara Lewis Holmes' blog Read Write Believe.

Picture credit: http://bluerosegirls.blogspot.com/

Happy Birthday, Alex

Today is my son’s 19th birthday and I am sending a shout out to him to wish him every good thing today and always. He is a wonder to me, a young man grown out of my blonde angel baby; a serious, loyal friend emerging from a playful toddler marching to his own drummer; a smart and thoughtful son from the ticklish baby I carried to Africa and back. Happy birthday, Alex. I look forward to watching what you will be and do next. Here’s a poem to guide you on your way.

A Time To Talk
by Robert Frost

When a friend calls me from the road
And slows his horse to a meaning walk,
I don't stand still and look around
On all the hills I haven't hoed,
And shout from where I am, "What is it?"
No, not as there is a time to talk.
I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,
Blade-end up and five feet tall,
And plod: I go up to the stone wall
For a friendly visit.

From: Schmidt, Gary D., ed. 1994. Poetry for Young People: Robert Frost.
Illus. by Henri Sorenson. New York: Scholastic. ISBN 0439254191.

FYI: An audio reading of the poem is also available here.