HEAR MY PRAYER by Lee Bennett Hopkins

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

Today’s tagline: Poetry that offers hope

Guest Reviewer: Cherilyn Loving

Featured Book: Hopkins, Lee Bennett. 2011. Hear my Prayer. Zonderkidz.

From Cherilyn: Here is the link to the booktrailer I created for Hear My Prayer.

Tomorrow’s tagline: Poetry about peace

[We’re now more than halfway through Poetry Month—still time to grab a copy of PoetryTagTime, an e-book with 30 poems, all connected, by 30 poets, all connected and downloadable right now at Amazon for your Kindle or Kindle app for your computer, iPad or phone. Just 99 cents.]

Image credit: Zonderkidz; PoetryTagTime

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

REQUIEM by Paul B. Janeczko

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

Today’s tagline: More poems about history

Guest Reviewer: Debbie Owen

Featured Book: Janeczko, Paul B. 2011. Requiem: Poems of the Terezin Ghetto. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick Press. ISBN 978-0-7636-4727-8.

Debbie writes: In this small, but powerful book, poet Paul B. Janeczko gives readers a haunting look into the lives of Jews imprisoned in the Terezin Concentration Camp. Terezin was proudly hailed by Hitler as a sanctuary for artistic Jews. As proof of this refuge, The Red Cross was allowed to tour the camp. Janeczko chronicles this visit in the poem titled “SS Lieutenant Theodor Lang” found below.

Though most of the characters in Janeczko's poems are fictional, the poems were informed by research and based on historical events and facts. Janeczko uses the “Author's Note” to inform readers on factual aspects of his book. Though not completed yet in this ARC, there is a section reserved at the back of the book for “English Translations of Foreign Words”. Janeczko also provides readers with additional resources such as books, websites, and DVD's. Artwork found at Terezin after the war is distributed throughout. These dramatic black and white drawings are a testament to the atrocities experienced by the Jews. In this advance copy, all artwork is not yet finalized.

Paul B. Janeczko provides readers with a moving, lyrical view into the hearts of the imprisoned men, women, and children of Terezin Ghetto as well as German soldiers. It's this look into the perspective of German soldiers that makes Janeczko's Requiem: Poems of the Terezin Ghetto one of the more unique books on Holocaust poetry.

Highlighted Poem (excerpt) from Requiem: Poems of the Terezin Ghetto

SS Lieutenant Theodor Lang
“Because of the meddlesome king of Denmark
we were forced
to allow
Red Cross inspectors to visit our town.
We had months to prepare
our show, a charade
to show them that there was no truth
to the pesky rumors about how
we treated our Jews.”

The poem details the preparations for the Red Cross visit, and yet, ends with the chilling truth:

“The inspectors
were in our town for a short time,
only long enough to see
what we wanted them to see.
No more.
They saw enough
to know that we were treating the Jews
in a civilized and humane manner.
We waited a few months
to resume the transports.
The town was getting crowded
and the ovens of Auschwitz waited.”

Connections
Teachers could use this poem in a study of the propaganda used during WWII and Hitler's use of it for the express purpose of covering up the systematic slaughter of millions of Jewish citizens.

Tomorrow’s tagline: Poetry that offers hope

[We’re now more than halfway through Poetry Month—still time to grab a copy of PoetryTagTime, an e-book with 30 poems, all connected, by 30 poets, all connected and downloadable right now at Amazon for your Kindle or Kindle app for your computer, iPad or phone. Just 99 cents.]

Image credit: Candlewick; PoetryTagTime

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

THE GREAT MIGRATION by Eloise Greenfield

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

Today’s tagline: More poems about African American history

Featured Book: Greenfield, Eloise. 2011. The Great Migration: Journey to the North. Ill. by Jan Spivey Gilchrist. Amistad/HarperCollins.

This new poetry picture book from NCTE Poetry Award winner, Eloise Greenfield, is a very personal work with a powerful, historic reach. She opens the book with a one-page narrative explaining the meaning of "the Great Migration," the mass movement of African Americans from the southern part of the U.S. to the North between 1915 and 1930. She situates her own family and her own "migration" in this context and the final poems weaves in details of her own family's story. Her frequent illustrator, Jan Spivey Gilchrist, has a similar story-- also noted-- and I wondered if some of the images of people (particularly their faces) were drawn from her or Greenfield's own family trees. Possibly!

This is an interesting use of poetry to convey a chronological history with key poems numbered and titled as follows:

I. The News
II. Goodbyes (Man; Girl and Boy; Woman; Very Young Woman)
III. The Trip (5 page stanzas)
IV. Question (Men and Women)
V. Up North

ending with:

My Family

Greenfield uses free verse, but sets up a structure that gives each poem reading a strong rhythm. Here's the opening poem as one example:

I. The News
by Eloise Greenfield

They read about it, heard
about it, in letters and newspapers
sent down from the North,
from visiting cousins and brothers
and aunts: there were jobs up there,
nice houses, no Ku Klux Klan
everywhere you turn, burning down
schools and homes and hope.
They thought about it, talked about it,
spread the word. "Did you hear the news?
Can it really be true? Well, I'm going
to see. How about you?"

Gilchrist's illustrations incorporate watercolor along with collage to blend scenes of landscape and personal portraits (often faces "lifted" from actual photographs), many set against a stark, black page. Thus, most of the poems appear in white text against a dark or black background for an even greater visual and symbolic impact. The combined effect of art that suggests real people along with a strong voice throughout the poem (often named) lends itself to reading aloud or dramatic performance.

Connections
Greenfield provides a "Selected Bibliography" at the conclusion of her book listing other books about this subject that you may want to consult. Kids may want to conduct community interviews to investigate the experiences of "migrating" families in their area. Discuss the similarities and differences between "migrants" and "immigrants" then and now.

Tomorrow’s tagline: More poems about history

[We’re halfway through Poetry Month—still time to grab a copy of PoetryTagTime, an e-book with 30 poems, all connected, by 30 poets, all connected and downloadable right now at Amazon for your Kindle or Kindle app for your computer, iPad or phone. Just 99 cents.]

Image credit: HarperCollins; PoetryTagTime

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