Time for a Poem

When a whole bunch of people tell you You Need to Read This, I've learned to listen.

That's why I put my librarian skills to work to find Kathi Appelt's poem,
ODE TO MY SOUTHERN DRAWL.

It's in a book, POETRY AFTER LUNCH, that I borrowed from the library.
I've now renewed it the maximum time. It needs to go back.

I'll share just a little bit of the Southern Drawl poem here. I love it.

Here in the south
we treat words like wine
letting them rest in our mouths
until they are ripe and
have soaked into the sides of our cheeks.
And sometimes they get so warm,
we have to cool them
off with iced tea
or Coca Cola

You can find other poems by Kathi on the Poetry Starter page on her website. Like this one about tomato sandwiches and FIGS. (You never saw that coming, did you. But you know I'm going to love a poem that even mentions figs.)
Here's the link to Tomato Sandwich, and some great ideas about teaching and using poetry in the classroom:
http://www.kathiappelt.com/poetry/ps1.html


PS: I have a really terrible, but readable, scan of the entire ODE TO MY SOUTHERN DRAWL poem which I'll send anybody who leaves me a comment and lets me know where to send it.

Put a Poem in Your Pocket today

Did you know today is National Poem in Your Pocket Day, something that was such fun to celebrate when I was surrounded by enthusiastic kids in my days of school librarianing. Have you shared a poem this month? Do you have a poem in your pocket today?

If I were still strolling the school hallways, carrying a favorite short poem in my pocket, ready to read or share at a moment's notice, this is what it would be, the final verse from So Much Happiness

Since there is no place large enough

To contain so much happiness,

You shrug, you raise your hands, and it flows out of you

Into everything you touch. You are not responsible.

You take no credit, as the night sky takes no credit

For the moon, but continues to hold it, and to share it,

And in that way, be known.

~ Naomi Shihab Nye ~


But if I should need a poem to inspire me today, though I hardly need inspiring on a day like this, I might choose this one, from e.e. cummings, to put a thoughtful end to Poetry Month:

may my heart always be open to little
birds who are the secrets of living
whatever they sing is better than to know
and if men should not hear them men are old

may my mind stroll about hungry
and fearless and thirsty and supple
and even if it's sunday may i be wrong
for whenever men are right they are not young

and may myself do nothing usefully
and love yourself so more than truly
there's never been quite such a fool who could fail
pulling all the sky over him with one smile

~ e.e. cummings ~

Happy Birthday, Maya Angelou

Today is the birthday of Maya Angelou. How do I know this? I clicked over to the Writers' Almanac site, looking for my Poem-a-Day for Poetry Month. Yes, April is Poetry Month, one of those events celebrated in schools and on publishers' web pages, but really shouldn't poetry be something we think about- celebrate- every day, not just during April?

Here's my favorite quote by Maya Angelou. I've had it tacked up on various corkboards, as I've moved from state to state, house to house, waiting for each house to become home. That's a close-up of my messy board. That's her quote. Can you see it?


You can never go home again, but the truth is you can never leave home, so it's all right.
~Maya Angelou

I love that thought.

And since I kept on clicking and scrolling down the Writers Almanac website, I learned it's also the birthday of blues great Muddy Watters-- (McKinley Morganfield), born in Rolling Fork, Mississippi (1915), who taught himself to play harmonica and guitar. He played in various bands in bars on the south side of Chicago, and in 1950, he made the first recording for Chess Records, a tune called "Rolling Stone." He later became famous for songs like "Hoochie-Koochie Man" and "Got My Mojo Working."

Rolling Fork, Mississippi, right down the road from my real home.


Related posts: Poetry Month, Poetry Month Pt. 2

April is Poetry Month

OK, I think I already said that. But I loved my Poem-a-Day poem today- You're Beautiful, filled with funny things, and thoughtful things, and irony. Here's a taste, but go ahead, click on that link up there, and read the whole thing. While you're there, sign up for your own Poems Each Day, just for Poetry Month.

You’re beautiful because you can’t work the remote control.
I’m ugly because of satellite television and twenty-four-hour
rolling news.
...
You’re beautiful because you’ve never seen the inside of a
car-wash.
I’m ugly because I always ask for a receipt.

You’re beautiful for sending a box of shoes to the third
world.
I’m ugly because I remember the telephone numbers of
ex-girlfriends and the year Schubert was born.