National Poetry Month Issue 3

I first read Janice Lynch Schuster's poem "Teaching the Girls" as part of a Poetry Friday post. In it, the speakers children spar in the kitchen before dinner.

At the time, I was in residence at a middle school. I thought, "I love the poem, because I am a parent like the speaker. But I wonder what the girls in the poem have to say about this scene."

Middle and high schoolers, your National Poetry Month prompt of the day is to remember a family scene like the one in "Teaching the Girls." It's dinner, and the kids are messing around. The adult in the room joins in, or balks the fuss.

Tell one stanza from a kids' point of view, but the second stanza from the parent's perspective.

Teaching the Girls
by Janice Lynch Schuster

After dinner the girls shadow box

In the kitchen. There is small space
For their joy, their blonde energy
As they bob and weave near the counter.


I warn them about the hot
Burners, coffee pot and knives.
Metaphors fly; they are merry and warm,
I am their crazy coach, reciting
Combinations as what’s left of dinner burns.

Chin down, guard up!
Light on your feet,
Snap that punch!

I’ve been training them for years
For the punches life will land,
The world beautiful and brutal,
Everyday and extraordinary.

I want them ready to slip
Through it as we do this night,
So wired by their own lives,
Nothing crowding them in a corner
The whole arena of my love
Resounding in their laughter.

Posted with permission of Janice Lynch Schuster.

Alternate prompt:
If the two-point-of-view prompt doesn't work for you, try this instead:

I found it surprising that the parent in the poem is teaching the girls how to box. Did anyone ever teach you how to do something out of the norm or unexpected?

Maryland poet Janice Lynch Schuster is a contributor to Life in Me Like Grass on Fire, which I'll be featuring all month. She has a book coming out this year, Handbook for Mortals: Guidance for People Living with Serious Illness, which she co-authored.

Sestina: High School

We've been visiting with my middle schoolers at St. Jane Frances School this week.

After our lesson on wordplay, we were ready to write our final poem -- a sestina.

The sestina is a complex form structured around end words rather than a rhyme scheme. You can read about it here.

These are the steps we used to write a group sestina in Ms. Habicht's 8th grade class.

1. Brainstorm possible topics
We came up with a list, then voted. The class chose "High School" as the subject of their poem.

2. Brainstorm end/repeating words
We generated a large list, but narrowed it down to the six we wanted to use in our poem. They are:

CHANGE
NERVES
LOST
TEACH
FRESH
FRIENDS

3. Work in groups
Ms. Habicht split the class into six groups, one for each stanza of sestina. (They'd write the final stanza, or envoi, later). I gave each of the groups a sheet with the order of the six words for their stanza.

Ms. Habicht and I were impressed with the final poem. It captures the mixed emotions these students are feeling as they prepare for high school.

Since my son is also an eighth grader, this poem feels very real to me.

High School
 

by St. Jane Frances School English Class 8-1

Everything we once knew will change.

From the moment we step into school, we are nervous –

yet excited. We feel lost

like in a maze of people, who may teach

us the ways of high school. Fresh-

men like us will find true friends.

It’s time to say goodbye to our well-known friends,

and get ready for our big change

of becoming fresh-

men. Our bodies begin to show all signs of nerves

as our teacher

hands us the map of the school, knowing we’ll still get lost.

We reflect on the memories that will never be lost,

remembering walking through the Bazaar with green-tinged friends

and Mr. Kane strumming his guitar instead of teach-

ing. Although we seem confident, we are terrified of change

and hope that next year we can hide our nerv-

ousness, as we begin the blank page: the year we will be called fresh.

Starting out the year as a fresh-

man, middle school lost

in the past. Fighting nerves

as I try to make new friends.

Having mixed feelings about the oncoming change,

I wave goodbye to my teachers.

New school, new teachers.

It’s time to start fresh.

I’m excited about the challenge of change.

The fear of getting lost

scares me. I don’t want to leave my friends

because making new ones works on my nerves.

Chills race up my spine as I nerv-

ously glance at my new teacher;

remembering old friends.

I am a recluse freshman,

lost,

imagining myself in these halls of this new exhilarating world of change.

Sometimes change is good without the nerves

of feeling lost. I try to navigate my way to new teachers,

Fearing freshman year, though I know I’ll make the best of friends.

Thanks to the families at St. Jane Frances School for giving me permission to post the children's poems this week.

National Poetry Month is almost here!

All month, I'll be posting classroom-friendly poems by Maryland poets. These poets are featured in the new anthology Life in Me like Grass on Fire, just out from Maryland Writers Association. 

Simple Odes

One of my favorite poetry workshops for schools is writing simple odes.

I use the same model poem for elementary and secondary students, Gary Soto's "Ode to Pablo's Tennis Shoes." (There's a printable version for teachers here.)

With younger students, I ask everyone to take off a shoe and write an ode to it. They need a tactile object to smell, touch, and see in order to write a juicy ode. I've posted the full lesson and some elementary responses here.

Middle schoolers understand the use of tone in a simple ode. The words and phrases we use give the reader a new, elevated experience of an every day object. These students no longer need the support of an assigned topic.

I've had wonderful odes on the EXIT sign in the classroom, a bookmark, and in Sarah P's very juicy ode, an orange.

Ode to the Orange 

by Sarah P. (7th Grade, St. Jane Frances School)

The small sphere of sunshine

is revealed as the knife

slices into the golden flesh

of the orange halves.

Juice swells from the orange,

ready to burst

as it        d

                r

                i

                p

                s

d

  o

     w

         n

from the knife

like the color of

precious honey.

The golden tiles of the orange

piece together

like glass forming a mosaic.

As the fragrance

of the orange rises

the divine aroma gathers around me,

tempting me to take a bite.

I can’t resist and sink my teeth in,

getting a sneak peek of heaven.

Posted with permission of the poet and her family.

I love Sarah's playfulness in this poem. The descriptions themselves aren't enough to capture the experience of eating an orange, so she uses some concrete-poem techniques to add to the reader's sensory experience of this "bright object."

Thanks to St. Jane Frances School in Pasadena, MD for allowing me to share student work. I'll be back with more middle school poems tomorrow as we gear up for National Poetry Month.

Poetry Friday: Don't Be Listless, Part 2

For this middle school (and up) lesson in list poems, we've looked at a "found" model and a list-poem by master poet Laura Boss. See the previous post for these models and instructions.

Now it's time to write!

Here are the steps for your students:

1. Prewrite. Choose a topic and brainstorm loosely.
2. Find a rhythm and/or poetic order to your ideas.
3. Build to a surprise ending, or leave your reader with something to think about.
4. If you're stuck, go back to the first line. Use it as a refrain and begin a new idea or stanza from there.

Starter ideas:

• Things I want
• I remember
• I'm not/I have never
• I used to be, but now I am

I am partial to "not-poems." Teens get the idea that telling others what or who we are not is as revealing (sometimes more so) as stating who we are.

If you try the lesson, let me know how it goes. Hope your students enjoy it as much as mine did.

Thanks again to the wonderful Laura Boss for agreeing to share her poem. I hope you'll check out more of Laura's work.

Our host for Poetry Friday is Amy at Art of Irreverence.

Poetry Friday: Don't Be Listless, Part 1

List poems seem easy to throw together. Pick a topic. Make a list -- one item per line -- voila! Poetry.

That's like saying a haiku is as simple as 5-7-5.

Similar to haiku, the more thought a poet puts into a list poem, the richer the rewards. Reading and writing list poems can be an exercise in critical thinking, well-suited for middle school and older writers.

I created this lesson for a local middle school Writer's Guild. It was a huge hit! Non-teachers, feel free to skip the lesson-plan lingo and head straight for the model poem. Teachers -- Laura Evans will make the full lesson available at Teach Poetry K-12. Thanks, Laura.

List Poem Lesson
Skills:

• use a refrain to create rhythm
• build to a lift or surprise at poem's end
• pay attention to word/image choice to create tone

Materials:

• List (see below) from Found Magazine (copy for each student, or on projector)
• "At the Nuclear Rally" by Laura Boss (copy for each student)

1. Warm up discussion

• Who uses lists and why?
• If someone found a list you wrote, what would they know about you?

2. Read a "found poem" list from Found Magazine. Note -- screen the Found website before sharing items with kids.

• What do we know about the list-maker?
• How is the last item on the  list important?
• How is a list like a poem?

My writers loved working with this model. They got it! List items can show character. A surprising item at the end of a list adds depth for the reader.

3. Read "At the Nuclear Rally" by Laura Boss.

Laura Boss is a longtime Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Program poet, editor of LIPS magazine and was one of my first mentors. She is a master of the list-poem form.

This poem is available in many anthologies and Boss's books. I have it from her book, Reports from the Front (Cross-Cultural Communications, 1995).

At the Nuclear Rally

by Laura Boss

thinking of my father
who died of cancer of the pancreas
now linked to radiation

thinking of my father
who worked for the Atomic Energy Commission
that ran security check on him
questioning our neighbors in Woodbridge

thinking of my father
with a pen in his pocket
who could add four columns of figures
in his head but stayed poor
working for the OPA
while colleagues took
expensive presents

thinking of my father
who embarrassed me, singing in the car
with the radio on as I now do
who returned from government trips
with marzipan strawberries, bananas, grapes
who cooked Sunday breakfasts of chocolate
French toast (his special recipe)
and let my mother sleep late

thinking of my father
who was born Jewish
but never went to temple
never was Bar Mitzvahed

thinking of my father
who smelled of Chesterfields
who never hit, never spanked me
told me he was glad I walked home
with the only black woman
in my high school class

thinking of my father
who would have been at this rally
next to me tonight

Posted with permission of the author. Thanks, Laura!

4. Discussion of "At the Nuclear Rally"

• What items on the list stand out for you?
• What do we know about her father?
• How does the refrain add to the poem?
• Discuss the last stanza -- why is this last?

Boy, were the middle schoolers I visited ready to sink their teeth into this poem!

I'll post the related writing prompt and poetry starters later today. For now, head over to Amy at the Art of Irreverence for more Poetry Friday.