Poetry Friday: Announcing a LAST FIFTH GRADE Book Vine

H A P P Y  H A L L O W E E N

Carving by Dan Szczepanski 

Hey, all you trick or treaters, head to Jone MacCulloch's house for some poetry goodies. She's left the lights on at Check It Out, so you know it's safe to ring the doorbell.

I've been away from the Poetry Friday party for a few weeks, but I'm making it up to you with something extra special. THE LAST FIFTH GRADE OF EMERSON ELEMENTARY is going on an ARC tour!

Cover Snark called THE LAST FIFTH GRADE
"rather macabre." Now Mr. Poe wants to read it
to find out if she was serious. (She wasn't.)

I'm so grateful for everyone in the Poetry Friday community who has followed the progress of my middle grade novel-in-verse and cheered me on over the years. The book doesn't come out until April 12, but here is your chance for a sneak peek.

I'm sending THE LAST FIFTH GRADE on a book vine, especially for Poetry Friday bloggers. You'll find the sign-up form by clicking on THIS LINK. Simply fill out the form to participate. Once twelve people have signed up, I will contact everyone by email with the details.

And here is a Halloween poem that was cut from the book -- a special little Halloween treat just between us ghouls.

Halloween

By Brianna Holmes

My favorite day is Halloween.

I get to be a wicked queen,

a princess who’s got lots of cash,

a zombie dancing Monster Mash.

I’ll be a vampire, dressed in black,

blood on my sleeves, lace down my back

and make the little kids afraid,

marching in the school parade.

I’ll trick or treat in neighborhoods

where it’s safe and the candy’s good.

I thought Hannah would go with me

if I made her a witch’s dress for free.

But she said Halloween is dumb

walking ‘til your feet are numb,

lugging all the treats you’re taking,

eating ‘til your stomach’s aching.

What’s up with her? How can it be?

I thought Hannah was just like me.

P.S. Are you checking out the cover to see which character is Brianna? She's in the bottom row in her snazzy beret.

P.P.S. Check out yesterday's post for a very cool pairing of a book (Jeff Garvin's SYMPTOMS OF BEING HUMAN) and a poem by one of the HUMANS OF NEW YORK. Your teens will thank you.

Poetry Friday: Monsters

It’s the first Poetry Friday of Halloween month. Today I’m going to tell you about great Halloween read for teens. There will be a poem, too. We’ll save that for last.

Heidi Mordhorst is kicking off
our Happy Halloween season
at My Juicy Little Universe.

The book in question is a horror novel, one I loved, even though I almost never read horror. I am not brave when it comes to scary books. Or movies. Or TV shows. If you insist on watching the Halloween episode of “Little House on the Prairie,” I will quietly disappear from the room before things get intense.

But I made an exception for the YA novel SHALLOW GRAVES by my fellow 2016 debut author, Kali Wallace. I bravely signed up to read Kali’s ARC. I took a funny picture of my dog freaking out with fear. 

No dogs were harmed in the taking of this picture.
Rudy just looks ridiculous when he yawns.

To explain why I fell in love with the story of a Breezy Lin, a teenage revenant (not “zombie,” please, our protagonist is neither mindless nor is she into eating brains), I have to tell you a true story.

Last weekend, my friend’s niece was in a terrible car accident. Although she survived, one of her friends was killed. How will this teenager cope? Witnessing the death of a classmate will irrevocably change who she is and how she interacts with the world.

So, my question is, how do teens begin to recover from this kind of intense trauma? The same question is at the heart of SHALLOW GRAVES. The more I thought about the novel, the more I realized that -- like the best science fiction and fantasy books -- the story serves as a metaphor for difficult things that we confront in real life.

Pre-order from Amazon.

A year after she is murdered, seventeen-year-old Breezy Lin wakes up in a shallow back-yard grave. The circumstances of her revival are mysterious, magical, and as violent as her initial death.

Although she wants nothing more than to return, alive, to her life as it was, Breezy is fundamentally a different person because of the trauma she has experienced. She can’t go back to her family or be her old self. Instead, she has to let go of the labels with which she once defined herself (future astronaut – that’s not going to happen) and find new, more complex ways of understanding who she is. METAPHOR.

Breezy’s quest to find out what she is and how she came to be undead takes her to some truly frightening places. Along the way, Breezy is forced to learn how to tell the difference between those who want to help her and those who want to hurt her (a great cast of religious fanatics, ghouls, and one ancient creature so evil, your skin will crawl), a skill she did not have when she was alive.

SHALLOW GRAVES was recently reviewed by Kirkus. Check out what they had to say here. 

Breezy is courageous in her willingness to confront the truth. Underneath this tale of imagined monsters is a real road map for survivors. Because the paranormal elements are a metaphor, a lens for looking at real human experience, the reader  follows along as Breezy copes with trauma, recognizes that it has changed her forever, and begins the process of being comfortable with who she is now.

I wanted to find the perfect poem to read alongside Kali’s wonderful book. And here it is…

Monsters

By Dorothea Lasky

This is a world where there are monsters

There are monsters everywhere, raccoons and skunks

There are possums outside, there are monsters in my bed.

There is one monster. He is my little one.

I talk to my little monster.

I give my little monster some bacon but that does not satisfy him.

I tell him, ssh ssh, don’t growl little monster!

And he growls, oh boy does he growl!

And he wants something from me,

He wants my soul.

Read the rest at the Poetry Foundation.

Stay spooky.

HOWL-oween Onomatopoeia Poems

Dear Reader

Beware this bag of treats! 

Onomatopoeia poems may be delightful

Or frightful.

Enter ... if you dare.

Our Halloween hostess is Linda Baie
at Teacher Dance.
Make like a skeleton and skitter
on over to the Poetry Friday party.

Happy Halloween, everyone! This week, I started a new residency at Manor Woods Elementary School. I am having so much fun writing poems with the third grade students.

Our first workshop was on onomatopoeia poems. You can read my full lesson at this post (Apologies! Blogger ate my old post. I'm working on a new write-up of this lesson. Look for it this week). The model poem is Eve Merriam's "Weather."

We all described a place or activity, relying mainly on the sounds we hear to give the readers clues. Many students in Ms. Kaz's class thought trick-or-treating on Halloween would make a great sound poem. I agree!

These are very much first drafts. I have added minor punctuation and line breaks for ease of reading. The rest is all third grade poetry.

Halloween Poem
By Megan F.

Stomp stomp stomp.
running down the sidewalk.

Ring! Trick or treat.
Thank you

Chuckling ha  ha ha!
Going house to house

When I get home
I rush upstairs.

Smelling the candy.
I sort and sort till it's done.

Crunch crunch crunch rip.
I leave a mess on the floor -- oops.

I feel lots of candy wrappers.
It's like I'm in a pound of candy.

Image from MintLife Blog

Halloween Poem
By Patrick B.

Shot! Stomp, stomp. Ding dong.
Trick or Treat! Drop, drop. Thank you!
Flash, flash. Talking.
Whoosh, whoosh. Lights.
Different dresses, scary, funny.
P.U. Chit chat. Branches moving.
Running fast. Thunk. Ouch!
Swish, swish, shadows,
decorations, pumpkins, parties.
Crack. Shot! Loud. Yum, yum.
Sour, sour. Ha ha.
Goodnight.

I hope you enjoy some delicious treats for Halloween. Thanks to the third grade team, students,  and families at Manor Woods for giving me permission to share these poems. More student poems are on the way. Stop by next week for more onomatopoeia and opposite poems.

A (True) Ghost Story

Writerly friends, my family has two camps re: the ghost thing. Some of us believe. Some of us don't. The believers find it impossible to wake the skeptics when a vision skimpily clad in reality appears to us in the middle of the night.

You can take a ghost tour in my home town,
old Ellicott City.

This happened (really):

The Old Hotel

by Laura Shovan

There was a cackle in the hall,

a creak, a heavy footstep fall

that night we spent in Montreal.

My mother said, “An old hotel!

Haunted, but we might as well

enjoy the spooky clientele.”

And that is when she passed out cold,

leaving me, more shy than bold,

to watch the long, long night unfold.

I fell asleep, and it was dark

as black cat’s fur when some odd spark

or shimmer caused me to remark,

“Are you awake?” for standing near

my mother’s bed, a woman sheer

as smoke had not yet disappeared.

I am entering "The Old Hotel" in Susanna Leonard Hill's Halloweensie writing contest. The rules are simple: child appropriate, 100 words, must include "black cat," "cackle," and "spooky" in the text. Deadline is 10/31, natch.

Give it a go!

From FanPop. 
Sadly, black cats are at risk of abuse on Halloween.

I have one other poem about the other side. It was part of the Poetry Postcard Series, and includes a ghostly photograph from Williamsburg, VA. You'll see a close-up of the ghost (a little girl) at this post.