Poetry and Other Distractions...

As previously noted, my friend Beverly and I memorize poems. Her choices are better/ harder/ longer than mine. But that's the way my mushy brain is working these days. Beverly understands and lets me delight over Mary Oliver, stumble over Wordsworth, laugh when Billy Collins makes fun of torturing a confession out of a poem.

This week she chose "The World is Too Much With Us."  And how prescient of my friend to recite that this sad week. 

So, what have I been reading to share on this Monday, Memorial Day?

 I've mostly been reading grownup poetry, but I pulled this one off my shelf and delighted in it all over again.

I'm going to link to THIS because it says so much about the book, and the poet.

Much more than my mushy brain (see above) can articulate this morning.

As always, middle-grade novels continue to (mostly) hold my attention.

This might be one of my favorite book cover images in a while.  (Except the author makes a point that the narrator is slightly overweight, maybe she used the word dumpy. I'm going to overlook that in favor of the notebook paper filled with words.)

It says a lot about the story. True confessions, I haven't finished WORSER but I'm going to make it my number one To Do thing today- finish WORSER. I'm getting close and loving almost every word.

Yesterday I had a conversation with a retired school counselor who believes, not surprisingly to anybody working in education today, that bullying is a huge issue, maybe the issue. I'm going to keep reading this one before I comment more. Bullying, so far, is not the theme, but it is prevalent and the kids in Worser's world are slightly on the fringes, susceptible to all sorts of teasing.

 

My life is kind of complicated lately, but reading makes me happiest so although I continue to retreat from sharing too much, frequent blogging, posting meaningless trivia, I'll stick to poetry, mysteries, middle-grade novels and puppies.

 Cheers to all the teachers pushing through these days,  holding their students in the light. 

 

And, on this Memorial Day, bless the families whose soldiers have died fighting for our country.

 

 

 

 

April is Poetry Month

 When I lived and worked in New Jersey, one of the (few) things I loved about April was celebrating poetry. 

    Put a Poem in Your Pocket

    a Poetry Assembly

    Reading all the fun, funny, poignant poems shared here and there. 

That and a few forced forsythias kept me smiling through what was often dreary weather.

Fast forward a few years and we've found ourselves back on the East Coast in a more southerly spot, Washington DC.

Where the weather is more agreeable and the flowers are earlier. So April is fast becoming a favorite month. And there's still POETRY to be shared. Now I'm sharing it with one of my dearest friends.

The idea came when Judith Viorst addressed a group I was part of. At the end, a questioner asked her how she kept so sharp. Sudoku? Crossword puzzles? 

Nope, she memorizes poetry!

I was all over that. So now my friend Beverly and I memorize a FEW VERSES AT A TIME of a favorite poem. We both agree that this was something we did in Mrs. Glassco's senior English class, from Robert Burns to William Wordsworth, and a lot in between (not so much after, however). 

Her first poem contained many stanzas. Christopher Marlowe! She learned them all!       (But I have too much fluff in my brain! Like how to drive to the nearest CVS, or the library, or Beverly's house! Driving directions, among many other new things, are clogging my brain.)

So mine was a more modest attempt, Mary Oliver.

 

My new choice is a short, wonderfully metered Emily Dickinson verse.   

(Note to self. Easier to memorize poems that rhyme.)

Oh, and I didn't find this week's selection, "Hope is the thing with feathers" this way but I loved reading this, about her poetry just now in Publisher's Weekly.

It's been a long time and not-so-many words since I last blogged. But I want to keep up with these poems so I'm going to attempt to track them here. Stay with me if you'd like and tell me your favorite poem. 

Have you memorized anything lately? 

Do kids even do this in school? 

Newpapers: Mississippi to Montreal

It amazes and pleases me so much when somebody from Far Away really seems to get Glory!

Thank you Montreal (yes, that's CANADA) Gazette:

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Mississippi+girl+knows+pool+closed/6169931/story.html

And thanks, also, to my local hometown newspaper. I grew up reading the BOLIVAR COMMERCIAL when it was published one day a week. I was the editor of our high school newspaper, the Cleveland Hi-Lite (yes, that's how it was spelled), an insert into the weekly paper. Many things in that newspaper made me mad, even in high school. And some things were just plain fun. (What was Mrs. Glassco's "society" column called? I.C. All? Who remembers!)

And here I am, all these years later, in the Sunday Edition!

http://www.bolivarcom.com/view/full_story/17592221/article-Scattergood-to-hold-book-signing?instance=main_article

A Good Blog...

It's my turn over at the group blog I write for. Although we have assigned topics about writing, we don't always have to follow. This time up, I took the guidelines and fiddled a bit. Our fearless leader, Kathy Patrick (who's vying for a spot on Dancing With the Stars! An author spot!) suggested we blog about books that have inspired us, who our favorite authors might be, who is our author Best Friend.

I wrote about two writers. One from my earliest writing and editing days in Cleveland High School. By my senior year, Miss Effie Glassco had taught senior English at CHS, possibly since my dad had been in school there. We studied the textbook I would use in my freshman college English class (which I was able to slide through because of Mrs. Glassco!), and for our literature assignments, there was no looking at the book during discussions. Either you knew it or you were mortified. This was in the days of "tracking" and we were probably what would now be AP English, and I'd never studied so hard in my entire high school career. But wow, did I learn a lot.

My second Author Best Friend, from the post, is the person frequently on the other end of my HELP! emails and phone calls, Leslie Guccione. She's one of those mentors who believes in passing the goodness around, paying it forward.

If you click over to the Southern Writers blog, be sure to spend some time there. Kerry Madden wrote a recent post about her favorite book, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Don't miss it. You'll probably find some of your Author Best Friends there, waiting to be read!