How to use this Page

How might you use writing to tap into your personal passions? Are you writing a piece that makes you "ache with caring"? And in a chock-full, busy-every-minute life, how can educators find time for writing that is deeply meaningful, with the lens of replicating this experience for students?

Add a Comment

Add a Comment

TUESDAY:

Flickr Creative Commons photo by Flood G.

WEDNESDAY:

Add a Comment

Add a Comment

Mid-August. When the crickets sing all day in the long grass and the sky invents blue every morning. A lovely time to savor the moments with small bites of haiku, no? That's what I was thinking when we made the proposed schedule for a year of playing with poetic forms, my Poetry Sisters and I. Then someone threw a wrench in it last month, and suggested we try writing haiku in the form of

Add a Comment

Once, my son found a "help wanted" ad:

Remove nest of baby copperheads
from under porch. Will pay $20.

I always wondered if anyone was desperate enough to answer.  I mean, come on---they're BABY copperheads, right?

That's the thing about classifieds. They suggest (perhaps willfully) that if only you answer them, the full story will be revealed. More likely, the truth is that if you answer the ad, you become part of the story, too.

I think the same give and take applies to poetry. Which is good, because this month, the Poetry Sisters are playing with haiku/senryu in the form of classified ads. I wrote several because I couldn't help myself.

Add a Comment

I have spent the month of July with Mom, getting her and her home of 60 years ready for her move to assisted living. Besides taking lots of photos, I saved a bit of time each day to take a snapshot in words. Here is a haiku-mosaic of July:


The move

1
the to-do list grows
fills heaping bowls of sadness
tears overflow

11
a childhood filled
with mother's sacrifices
daughter's turn now

21
shelves and shelves of books
multi-storied richness
wealth measured in words

26
going through dresser drawers
layers of memory
the archaeology of a life

two children
visitors at the museum
of their mother

an inveterate archivist
saver of minutiae
savoring each scrap of life

one more time

30
transplanting is tricky
handle roots with loving care
mix old soil with new




Meditations on the cycle of life and my place in it right now

9
midseason lily
surrounded by bud and wilt
enjoy it now

14
leaf breaks free
flutters away from tree
wind brings it back

Being in Eastern Colorado

4
ripening wheat
indiscriminate thunderheads
farmers remain hopeful

7
unseasonably cool
north breeze, low clouds, drizzle
roofer's gun pops

8
typically blue skies
smudged with a grimy haze --
Canada burns

19
antelope grazing --
uncharacteristically
green and lush prairie










Keri has the Poetry Friday roundup this week at Keri Recommends.

Add a Comment

Kimberley has the Poetry Friday roundup this week on Google+.

Add a Comment

Tough times when a person's favorite people move away. Sending texts to simply say "We miss you," gets old...to say nothing of annoying. So today, I took another tactic.

"This screen is empty/ no when, no where, no questions/ an expanse of gone."

The reply came line by line. "Memorial day.". " going to the pool soon". "Hope all is well, Mom.". " That's a haiku."

And so it continued.  At one point I got this message. "I could do this all day.".

So could I.

Some more haiku texts: " I don't want to walk.". "But D-c- wants to walk there." " So walking it is."

"Not really walking." "Your dad is carrying you." "And he is tired."

My text haiku deteriorated after my first attempt.

I am finished now. My screen is dressed in letters. My heart is at rest.

Add a Comment

Lucy takes her grandparents
on the worst/best cruise ever:
Heart-wrenching.

Displacement by Lucy Knisley. Fantagraphics, 2015, 168 pages.

Add a Comment

I’m sorry to see National Poetry Month end. Mine went out with a bang, though, in a wonderful Family Literacy Night celebration at an elementary school in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Happily, the date coincided with Poem in Your Pocket Day.

What fun to see students so excited about poetry! To watch them proudly pull out and unfold their handwritten index cards. To hear them bravely recite their favorite poems.

I was able to narrow my own favorite poems down to eleven—quite an achievement, I think! I brought five copies of each to hand out in case anyone forgot theirs. I’m glad to say that I came home with only three poems and that many of the ones I handed out went to parents. I hope they’ll keep sharing.

On to May! For this Teaching Authors series, we’re writing about animals. Bobbi began with some favorite animal books.

For all of April (National Poetry Month), I wrote a haiku a day. (You can see the April archive on my blog.) I looked back through the poems and found that 13 of the 30 addressed animals, mostly birds. Here in Wisconsin, we see a lot of birds migrating through to summer homes at this time of year, so that seems logical. One thing I loved about the daily haiku practice is that this year, I noticed.

Here’s one more haiku from this morning. I can’t seem to stop!

Squirrel winds her way
from limb to limb, encumbered
mouth full of dry leaves

The Poetry Friday Roundup is at A Year of Reading, at least for now. Enjoy!

JoAnn Early Macken

Add a Comment

If she could turn back time . . .
she'd probably not tick off
the house spirit.

Seconds by Bryan Lee O'Malley. Ballantine, 2014, 336 pages.

Add a Comment

Title: Won Ton and Chopstick – A Cat and Dog tale Told in Haiku Written by: Lee Wardlaw Illustrated by: Eugene Yelchin Published by: Henry Holt and Company, LLC, 2015 Themes/Topics: cats, dogs, haiku, pets, friends Suitable for ages: 7-11 Hardcover, 40 pages Opening: It’s … Continue reading →

Add a Comment

Kicka$$ girls go camping,
fight monsters, and set up
for new adventures.

Lumberjanes Vol. 1: Beware the Kitten Holy by Noelle Stevenson, Grace Ellis, and Brooke Allen. BOOM! Box, 2015, 128 pages.

Add a Comment

I really need to
see someone put this show on
for real. Curtain up!

Hold Me Closer: The Tiny Cooper Story by David Levithan. Dutton, 2015, 208 pages.

Add a Comment

Everyone you meet
is fighting a battle you
know nothing about.

Read Between the Lines by Jo Knowles. Candlewick, 2015, 336 pages.

Add a Comment

More than your garden-variety
quirky middle-grade.
Trilobites!

Moonpenny Island by Tricia Springstubb. Balzer + Bray. 2015, 304 pages.

Add a Comment

Will she ever run
out of books? No way. Out of
energy? Maybe.

Add a Comment

This avowed prank-hater
still found these guys kinda
charming. (But trouble.)

The Terrible Two by Jory John and Mac Barnett, illustrated by Kevin Cornell. Abrams, 2015, 224 pages.

Add a Comment

A sturdy middle-grade
with wacky characters
and some light magic.

Lucky Strike by Bobbie Pyron. Levine/Scholastic, 2015, 272 pages.

Add a Comment

Lee Wardlaw is the author of 30 books for young readers, including Won Ton: A Cat Tale Told in Haiku, recipient of the Lee Bennett Hopkins Children’s Poetry Award, the Myra Cohn Livingston Award for Poetry, and the Purina/Fancy Feast “Love Story” Award.

Add a Comment

Enter to win a copy of WON TON–WON TON: A CAT TALE TOLD IN HAIKU and WON TON AND CHOPSTICK: A CAT AND DOG TALE TOLD IN HAIKU, by Lee Wardlaw and illustrated by Eugene Yelchin. Giveaway ends May 5, 2015, at 11:59 P.M. PST.

Add a Comment

CRAZY HOT GHOST ACTION!
Or, Why You Might Not Want
to Visit UK.

The Shadow Cabinet (Shades of London #3) by Maureen Johnson. Putnam, 2015, 400 pages.

Add a Comment

A little repetitive,yes,
but a powerful
read nonetheless.


Poisoned Apples: Poems for You, My Pretty by Christine Heppernan. Greenwillow, 2014, 128 pages.

Add a Comment

Grief in tangible and
intangible forms: a
deft meditation.

The Question of Miracles by Elana K. Arnold. Harcourt, 2015, 240 pages.

Add a Comment