I was the lucky winner of a free copy of Legacy by Nikki Grimes. I would have, should have a copy of this book, but hadn’t bought it yet. I recently subscribed to Chris Barton’s newsletter, and low and behold, was the winner of this book on my first month. You can be lucky, too. Subscribe here. His newsletters are full of stuff, author interviews on “This Book is Dedicated to”, promotional materials, and links to more.
In Legacy, Nikki Grimes uses the golden shovel form to celebrate women poets of the Harlem Renaissance. Each Renaissance poem is accompanied by a golden shovel and an illustration by a Black woman artist. It’s beautifully pulled together into 3 sections: Heritage, Earth Mother, and Taking Notice.
The poems I am featuring today are about poetry, the writing of poems. The fancy term is ars poetica.
Notice the tactile in this poem, kneel, wriggling, and my favorite “water which satisfies, soothes, tickles–what wet word/ pours itself into the vessel that/you call thought?” Nikki Grimes calls us to notice it all and make poetry.
And this one I will print out for my brown girl writers this year.
I love the instruction to “Write chocolate poems!” Can’t you taste it? I’ll bring in Dove chocolates, the kind with a message on the wrapper and hand them this poem. Yes! I’m excited to start a new year of teaching with this book in my hands. Thanks, Chris Barton and Nikki Grimes!
Reflections on the Teche 