We don’t get snow here, but the colder weather made me think of presenting Robert Frost to my students. I started with the beautiful Susan Jeffers illustrated book, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Then we read together Frost’s poem Acquainted with the Night and talked about rhyme scheme. A terza rima is a difficult form to write even for gifted kids, so we worked together. We started with a line from my own poem, Snow Day from Illuminate. My first group of students incorporated a repetitive pattern that I reminded them is called anaphora.
Collaborating, stealing lines, playing with rhyme, and writing from an image worked together to result in a nice poem.
Lost in the Snow
a terza rima after Robert FrostI wake to a field of white
where a bunny rabbit hides,
where a night owl takes flight,where Santa’s sleigh slides
where I stand on the ground
where a snowflake above me glides,where something is lost, not found,
where sight begins to fail,
where a whisper is the softest sound,where dreams set sail
and miles to go before I sleep
I am strong, not frail.Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I wake to a field of white.–A collaborative poem by Mrs. Simon’s class
My second group of students was larger, so the collaboration became more cumbersome. Too many different ideas don’t mix well with strong wills and sensitive writers. I don’t think the poem is as strong, either; however, I am struck by the sense of loss and sadness and overcoming that permeates each one. The images of snow covering the page and the words of Robert Frost set a tone for both of these poems.
Winter
Snow fell silently through the night.
These streets I have walked across
into the darkness, out of sight.The sun I have lost,
Frosting over the glass in this faded frame,
The windows are covered in frost.Each pattern has its own fame.
Sun rises, suddenly the cold vanished.
Once it is gone, it will never be the same.Stars above shining bright.
Snow fell silently through the night.a collaborative poem by Mrs. Simon’s class
Both are lovely, Margaret, & the learning in this is wonderful too. We have snow coming Sunday. Perhaps I’ll send a picture for your students?
Yes, send a picture. This is the only way we get to experience snow.
And here’s why you are an award-winning teacher… ;0)
Such a great experience for the young creators.
In the second, I did linger over this great line:
“Frosting over the glass in this faded frame” – that “faded frame” is nice.
And what a lush stanza in the first:
where something is lost, not found,
where sight begins to fail,
where a whisper is the softest sound,
Thanks for sharing!
Thanks, Robyn. We really worked hard to create meaning. I will share your comments with my students both because they help them feel like writers and it shows specificity in commenting.
Alliteration is a love of mine as well. Even though the word frost was repeated (we wrote the last line first), I wanted to include it for the sound.
Thanks again for visiting and reading like a poet.
Thanks for sharing these, Margaret. Both contain lovely images and make me feel wistful.
Oh, my gosh, I think these are wonderful! And I agree that in the first poem, the stanza where “something is lost, not found” is the moment where the poem really takes off – it’s a moment that the poet Robert Bly defined as “leaping poetry” and it’s interesting to try to identify that moment in any good poem – the moment where something happens to deepen and enrich what has been, up until that moment, pure description. Maybe the second poem feels a little less strong because that moment comes in the first stanza – the moment when someone crosses into the darkness. A lovely moment but I think the “leap” has to come a bit later in a poem (not at the end, that would be a mistake, but after slightly more setting of the scene?) But all in all, wow, terrific collaborative work!
So nice. I hope your students all experience one day snow falling silently in the night.
Amazing that they can write so provocatively about snow…having never experienced it!
These are truly lovely, Margaret! I am imagining all the conversations about word choice and line length as these were composed. What fun it must have been!
Margaret, hold those student poems for the next gallery, Winter Whisperings. I enjoyed reading them.
I think both poems are amazing. Thanks so much for sharing them and for sharing poetry with your students and challenging them to write and collaborate! Awesome!