Recently, my students read a poem where the eggs in a carton expressed terror at being removed by human hands and a Pablo Neruda poem about his socks–hand made, blue wool with a golden thread running through them. Their assignment was to also write a 20 line poem about something ordinary which they love or appreciate. One student wrote about my hair.
The instructions: write a poem about a pet or wild animal you love. Most of the students wrote about their dogs. Six more students requested I publish their dog poems. Here are three:
Kimba
my name is Kimba
I am really fun
but be very careful I like cinnamon buns
I run and I play
I sleep everyday
I ride in the car
but not very far
I really hate cats
They remind me of rats
I need to lose weight
So I can relate
back to when I was tiny
I thought I was so mighty
Author: Kayla Stephens
Sadie Mae
Sadie Mae is the best
Whatever she does, she makes a mess
She loves to play with all
especially her favorite ball
Sophie is her best friend
but their energy never ends
In the open pastures she runs wild
which gives her a big smile
In the middle of the bed she sprawls
sometimes you will see her crawl
Author: Jake Kenedy
Baps
My name is Baps. Milana
loves me I sleep on her
head so she can’t see
When Milana gets up I
have to get off When I
roll over I fall off
Milano needs me so does
Finley But beware of the
bird because he is my enemy
Be very careful we don’t get along
don’t put us together or he will
be gone.
Author: Milana Evers
Another student submitted a pond poem today:
The Pond
cold, still water
moss covering the surface
catfish swimming around the banks
frogs croaking like an old car horn
This is my pond.
Author: Harris Albracht
The following poem makes me laugh every time I read it:
Roger the Rabbit was an interesting rabbit
who had a eating habit
orange sour skittles were his favorite
He always savored it
He was white with black spots
And he slept lots
Rodger lived in a tree hosue
He was quiet as a mouse
Rodger is gone now
Thanks to the owl
He will be missed
But I am not very pissed
R.I.P. Rodger the Rabbit
Author: Jess Merrell
This past week in my sophomore English class, the students read poems by Amy Lowell and William Carlos Williams. I gave them the assignment to write about either a pond or a wheelbarrow. At first, they thought I had lost my mind. However, several decided they would like their poems published on this blog. The following are three poems the students asked me to publish:
The Pond
The frogs croak
quietly in the night
waiting for food
to come by.
The water shimmers
in the moonlight
like a lighthouse
to the ocean.
When you think of
the pond,
think of the beautiful
creatures that live
in it.
Author: Ali Matthews
Pond
Sittin in a pond,
watching the frogs jump by,
the fish sing
bloop! bloop!! bloop!!
Author: Skylee Isham
The Wheelbarrow
Behind my fence
sits a green wheel barrow.
It has been used many times,
but still looks brand new.
The wheelbarrow has sat through
all sorts of weather, and it
still works like a charm.
Author: Taylor Shugart
I heard this poem by Max Coots recited on Sunday and saved it to share today.
Let us give thanks:
For generous friends…with hearts…and smiles as bright as their blossoms;
For feisty friends as tart as apples;
For continuous friends, who, like scallions and cucumbers, keep reminding us we’ve had them;
For crotchety friends, as sour as rhubarb and as indestructible;
For handsome friends, who are as gorgeous as eggplants and as elegant as a row of corn, and the others, plain as potatoes and as good for you;
For funny friends, who are a silly as Brussel spouts and as amusing as Jerusalem artichokes, and serious friends, as complex as cauliflowers and as intricate as onions;
For friends as unpretentious as cabbages, as subtle as summer squash, as persistent as parsley, as delightful as dill, as endless as zucchini, and who, like parsnips, can be counted on to see you throughout the winter;
For old friends, who wind around us like tendrils and hold us, despite our blights, wilts, and witherings;
And, finally, for those friends now gone, like gardens past that have been harvested, and who fed us in their times that we might have life hereafter.
For all these we give thanks.
This is the title of my newest book which currently resides at the designers for formatting, placing the photos in the correct place and position, making sure everything is just right. The subtitle is: Adventures with Food, Family, and Friends. It includes family and travel stories, adventures, poems, and recipes. Here are a couple of food photos which will be in the book with recipes.
Every Sunday until publication, I will post an update as to progress. My goal is to have it available for purchase for Christmas presents for those who love food adventures.
Woman, wondrous, wild
daughter of the moon,
mysterious, magnificent
fierce secret keeper
guardian of the universal key.
My grandson cuts himself into 16 equal pieces:
4/16 Urhobo from Africa
3/16 Spanish from Spain
4/16 European–two Swiss German great, great-grandfathers
(Werth and Kaiser), Irish, English and who knows what
3/16 Mexican–whatever mixtures that may be
2/16 Navaho
Who am I? What am I?
Who are you? What are you?
Do we really know?
Who sets the rules?
white men
black
Indian
Native American
Irish
English
German
from where and for whom?
He looks Navaho:
-blue black straight hair
-pale brown skin
-obsidian eyes.
One four year old girl asks him,
“Are you American Indian?”
His six year old self says nothing.
She repeats,
“Are you American Indian?”
He says, “It’s complicated.”
The Navaho won’t claim him, too little blood.
He needs 1/4, not 1/8.
Caddy and Fort Sill Apache allow 1/16, not Navahos.
1/4 blood is for
-Sioux
-Cheyenne
-Kiowa
-Navaho
1/8 works for Comanche and Pawnee.
Some Cherokees only want a Cherokee ancestor.
But he is none of those.
Is he Navaho?
Is he white?
The old South goes by the one drop rule:
one drop of Negro…
Is a person with 99/100 per cent white
and 1/100 black, black?
Who says?
Kids at school ask, “What are you?”
He tells them.
They say, “You’re lying.”
I only know specifically about two ancestors,
the Swiss Germans.
Another great grandfather disappeared during the Civil War.
I don’t even know his name.
Who am I?
Who are you?
I think I’ll get a DNA test.
Then I’ll know how many pieces I need to cut myself into.
Note: This was originally published in my book “On the Rim of Wonder”. I had a cousin send me 75 pages of ancestry information. I looked up more myself. That one great grandfather remains a mystery. I had my DNA done. It did not match what I expected from the ancestry work.
Blood quantum is the term the US government used to determine whether a person would be qualified as an Indian. Now many Indian Nations use it to decide who can be on the tribal rolls and who cannot.
Evidence of Flossing, WHAT WE LEAVE BEHIND provides an unexpected metaphor for individual life, culture, and so much more. Nearly all the poems are accompanied with a photograph, often of trash in which lays a dental flosser (yes, one of those instruments with which you floss your teeth) with date and location. Flossing is supposed to prevent anything from being left behind. Hence, the title brings up an unusual play on words.
The first section Damage contains more than 20 poems which are a lament about much of modern life–mass shootings, the demise of wildlife, unpleasant changes. One poem asks the question: “Would God floss?” In the second section, Contact, the poems focus on the natural world, walks in the city, the woods, beaches. The third section, Connection, emphasizes the interconnectedness of everything, especially the relationships between humans and animals and nature. There are poems about frogs, storms, birds. One called Evidence of Fairies makes the reader feel the magic of old growth forests with moss and ancient trees. In the footnote to another poem she discusses the fact that wolf spiders actually create songs to lure lovers. Then, toward the end, the Alice poems appear, Alice as in “Alice in Wonderland”. In my favorite poem Payne relates her encounter with a stranger picking oyster mushrooms near a path in the woods.
After reading the poems and comments in this book, I will never view flossing the same way again. Will I find dental flossers now, something I never even previously thought about? I use those long strings of floss not flossers. Apparently the poems and flosser photos affected enough people that some sent Payne photos of flossers they saw here and there on the ground, some of which she has included in the book.
Even if I find no flossers, now I will certainly give a lot more thought to what I and others leave behind.
About the author: Jennifer Payne is the owner of Words by Jen, a graphic design and creative services company in Connecticut. She belongs to the Arts Council of Greater New Haven as well as several other arts and poetry organizations. Her work has been featured in various publications, including The Aurorean, Six Sentences, and the Story Circle Network. You can read some of her writing on her blog Random Acts of Writing.
“Most people are about as happy as they
make up their minds to be.” Abraham Lincoln
When I was twenty something, I chose happiness, not the sappy, syrupy, cheery, but a deeper joy of cherishing the small, the unique, the everyday, smiling with sunsets, the song of the mockingbird in spring, horses running free, the nearly invisible bobcat climbing the canyon wall, the taste of fine coffee at the first wakeful moments in the morning, cooking for friends, taking a “property walk” with my grandson, laughing with the teenagers I teach. I am driven to do little–obsessions, compulsions do not run me. I choose. Choose life, choose joy, or choose whining, choose lamenting. Choose!! Be who you want to be; do what you want to do.
Note: this is a poem from my book, “On the Rim of Wonder”.
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