POEM IN YOUR POCKET FOR YOUNG POETS by Bruno Navasky

Poetry Tag continues with a book review of a new book of poetry connected to yesterday's book review.

Today’s tagline: Poems to tear out

Featured Book: Navasky, Bruno. 2011. Poem in Your Pocket for Young Poets; 100 Poems to Rip Out & Read. Abrams.

What a fun way to end Poetry Tag—with a poetry collection kids can manipulate and make their own. The Academy of American Poets has a new poetry book out for young people-- that's totally rippable! Open the hard cover and inside is a pad of paper with each page containing a poem-- 100 poems in total-- each page designed to be ripped out like a tear-off calendar. Very fun! (The book is also available for purchase as a hardback with pages that are bound-- and aren't designed to be ripped out!)







The 100 poems are primarily by published for an adult audience, but are chosen with appeal to young readers (particularly tweens and teens) in mind. For example,

Substantial Planes
by A. R. Ammons

It doesn't
matter

to me
if

poems mean
nothing:

there's no
floor

to the
universe

and yet
one

walks the
floor.

Doesn't that have great kid appeal?!
Perhaps this will prompt young readers to take the poem with them, learn it/share it, build their own personal collections of favorite poems, tuck a favorite in their pockets, or look for another poem just like the one they love. 



Perhaps this will also prompt you to look for the next poetry book to tag and share. An anthology? A picture book collection? A new one? An old favorite? Keep the momentum going all year long.

Tag, you’re it!

[That’s it! Thus ends National Poetry Month. But don’t stop now. You can share a poem a day any month with the e-book, PoetryTagTime, an e-book with 30 poems, all connected, by 30 poets, downloadable at Amazon for your Kindle or Kindle app for your computer, iPad or phone for only 99 cents.]


Image credit: Photo Source: Center for the Art of Translation Blog.

Posting (not poem) by Sylvia M. Vardell and students © 2011. All rights reserved.