Poetry | Reflections on the Teche

Archive for the ‘Poetry’ Category

Slice of Life: Poetry Friday: Haiku

Posted in Digital Learning, Gifted Education, Poetry, Poetry Friday, Slice of Life, Writing, tagged Ethical ELA, haiku, Japanese characters on March 20, 2020| 24 Comments »

Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

Poetry Friday round-up is Michelle Kogan.
Click over to join the round up and to read poems from The Best of Today’s Little Ditty, including one of mine.

Ethical ELA posts a 5 day Poetry Challenge each month. (Next month, there will be a prompt every day for National Poetry Month.) This month I participated in only two days, but I shared one of the activities with my students this week on our Kidblog site.

Click here to see the full prompt from Jennifer Goyer-Jowett.

Her prompt included finding a Japanese character to write a haiku from. I chose river. (There isn’t one for bayou.)

In the process of finding this character, I discovered the Japanese word Kawaakari which means the gleam of last light on a river’s surface at dusk.

Last light of first day
glows like any other, yet
gleam lingers longer.
Margaret Simon, draft

Knowing my student Madison would jump on this prompt (she loves all things Japanese), I posted the prompt to my class Kidblog site. I’m sharing their wonderful responses.

Ember’s graceful flight,
Sparks fly, blizzards and tornadoes
of dire fire.
Madison, 6th grade

Image result for water japanese — Mizu means water

Maddox, 5th grade, wrote “The Japanese character I chose is mizu which stands for water. It represents the fluid flowing and the formless things in the world.”

fluid flowing streams
flowing in the wild forest
complete harmony
Maddox, 5th grade

Image result for japanese word character for tree — A.J., 6th grade, chose tree.

Standing tall and firm,
Strong arms supporting small twigs,
Uneven Fractal.
A. J., 6th grade

Breighlynn, 4th grade wrote, “My Japanese character is Kaze. Kaze is for wind. It represents Freedom of movement.”

Freedom of Movement
Going here and going there
I love to travel
Breighlynn, 4th grade

Read Full Post »

This Photo Wants to be a Poem

Posted in Photography, Poetry, Slice of Life, tagged 15 Words or Less, Kim Douillard, This Photo Wants to be a Poem on March 19, 2020| 38 Comments »

Welcome to This Photo Wants to be a Poem, a way to wake up your poetry brain. Please write a short poem (15 words or fewer) in the comments. Try to comment on other poems as well. Spread the word through sharing the link on social media.

Shells by Kim Douillard
Kim’s blog is Thinking through my Lens

I’ve been following Kim’s blog for a few years. We’ve never met face to face, but we’ve connect through National Writing Project and #clmooc and Slice of Life with Two Writing Teachers. I love how connections can be made across the continent. Kim lives near San Diego, California. She posts beach pictures often and is quite an amazing photographer. In this post here, she photographed a great white egret in her neighborhood.

Today’s photo from this post grabbed me and said it wanted to be a poem. Kim gave me her permission to use it. You can follow her on Twitter (https://twitter.com/kd0602) and Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/kd0602/).

If this is your first time, don’t hesitate to join in the poem fun. There are no critics here. It’s all good.

A circle of sea
wrapped in sand and shells–
a mosaic by the master.
Margaret Simon, draft 2020

Read Full Post »

Slice of Life: Poem Video

Posted in Bayou Song, Poetry, Teaching, Writing, tagged poetry instruction video on March 17, 2020| 23 Comments »

See more posts at Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life

Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.

With an open schedule on Monday, I decided to try to make my own instructional video from my book Bayou Song. I recorded it on my back deck with the Bayou Teche in the background. It wasn’t terrible, so I posted it. (I need to figure out where to look.)

My students are set up on Kidblogs, so I posted the video there and had a few poetic responses. With so many students out of school, I hope more will join in and write poems. Feel free to share.

Fun-loving,
Game-playing,
Glasses-wearing,
Youtube-watching,
Me.
by A.J.

I see
I see
kind-loving
warm-snuggling
happy-smiling
PERSON
by Karson

Best-soccer-defending,
Award-winning,
Newspaper-mentioning,
me-being.
Not-caring,
free-going,
not-quite-all-knowing,
random-fact-blurting.
Book-writing,
comic-drawing,
manga-reading,
creativity-and-craft-showing.
This is me,
even if you dislike it,
then that’s you-
and I’ll tell you what.
That’s that.
by Madison

Read Full Post »

This Photo Wants to be a Poem

Posted in Photography, Poetry, Writing, tagged 15 Words or Less, moon poems, This Photo Wants to be a Poem on March 12, 2020| 32 Comments »

Supermoon by Paula Bourque, used by permission.

This week’s full moon was known as the Full Worm Moon. Other names for March’s full moon are the Crow Moon, the Crust Moon, the Sap Moon, and the Lenten Moon.

This week’s moon was also a supermoon, meaning the fullness coincided with the moon at its closest point to Earth making it appear larger.

Moon, moon,
as you draw closer
I feel safer
knowing you’re
watching over me.
Margaret Simon, draft

Read Full Post »

Poetry Friday: Questions

Posted in Poetry, Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged question poem, wood duck house on March 6, 2020| 17 Comments »

Poetry Friday round-up is Rebecca at Sloth Reads

It’s another month, so that means a new challenge for the Sunday Night Poetry Swaggers. This month I posed the challenge of writing a question poem.

I had some pretty feeble starts at this one, but one day last week I was inspired by the very thing happening in our wood duck house. Last year we put up a wood duck house around this time of year, but the first clutch never hatched. We are watching through a Ring doorbell camera attached to the roof of the nest box.

We have another hen. She’s been sitting since February 24th, so projected hatch date is somewhere between March 16th and 18th. I have a good feeling about this hen. Even though we’ve had some cool nights, she sits all night and leaves once in the morning and once in the evening to feed. When she leaves, she completely covers the clutch with down, so we really have no idea how many eggs she is sitting on. We learned our lesson last year, so we will Not be going out there to check.

Stay tuned. In the meantime, my question poem.

Will She Come Again?
It’s February and we wonder
will she come again,
this wood duck mother hen?
Will she find the house we’ve built?
a box, like a cypress quilt,
waiting to be a home.
In the morning we look and see.
Papa wood duck, where is she?
Where’s your mate? Is she about?
Connected to our house WiFi,
we keep a daily eye,
a camera on the nestbox roof.
She’s in, then out, then in again,
this mother wood duck hen.
Will she lay a clutch?
How many eggs? It’s hard to tell.
She covers them all so well.
Plucks her down, soft and warm.
How does she know how?
Waiting, watching, wondering now
for twenty-eight more days.

Will wood duck chicks hatch from this downy haze?
Margaret Simon, (c) 2020

Read more question poems from my writing pals:

Heidi Mordhorst
Catherine Flynn
Linda Mitchell
Molly Hogan

Read Full Post »

This Photo Wants to be a Poem

Posted in Photography, Poetry, tagged Dr. Seuss, La Jolla, This Photo Wants to be a Poem on March 5, 2020| 14 Comments »

If you were in or close to any school on Monday, March 2nd, you may have seen kids dressed like Dr. Seuss characters. I had on a red t-shirt that said “Teacher One” and a bright blue feather hat. March 2nd is Dr. Seuss’s birthday. The celebration has been turned into Read Across America Day.

With Dr. Seuss on my mind, I saw this image on Facebook, but I had no idea there was a connection. Katherine Conley, otherwise known as “Other Katherine” when she was roommates with my daughter Katherine, was vacationing in La Jolla, California. She told me that there are signs of Dr. Seuss everywhere as Theodor Geisel lived there for a time and was inspired by the landscape to create The Lorax. I won’t continue the rabbit hole I fell down, but if you care to, I found some information here.

Please leave a 15 word or less poem in the comments and leave comments for other writers. This is a low stress writing prompt. Just go with your gut. Whatever comes is worthy.

Sometimes I wear flowers.
Sometimes I sing.
Sometimes I just pause.
Margaret Simon, draft

Read Full Post »

Poetry Friday: Gratitude

Posted in Gratitude, Photography, Poetry, Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged beach, Golden Shovel on February 28, 2020| 10 Comments »

Poetry Friday round-up is with Karen Edmisten.

Linda Baie shared a video on Facebook that I immediately took up as a writing prompt. It’s a beautiful short film by Louie Schwartzberg. (See link below to watch the video)

I took a quote from the young girl at the beginning and made a golden shovel. “The path could lead to a beach or something.”

Cultivate a response to the
day; open your eyes and a path
could be there, weather could
change, and lead
to water, to
a new way to see, a
gift as joyful as a beach,
waves blessing you or
moving you to touch something.
Margaret Simon, draft response

Photo by Margaret Simon, Santa Rosa Beach Florida

Kathy Mazurowski is the winner of the book giveaway for After Dark: Poems About Nocturnal Animals by David L. Harrison, illustrated by Stephanie Laberis. Click the link to read how I used the book with my students and wrote nonfiction poems.

Take a minute to write a quick 15 word poem to this week’s This Photo Wants to be a Poem. This week is a beautiful photo by Molly Hogan.

Read Full Post »

This Photo Wants to be a Poem:

Posted in Photography, Poetry, Writing, tagged Molly Hogan, This Photo Wants to be a Poem on February 27, 2020| 45 Comments »

Welcome to This Photo Wants to be a Poem, a low stress weekly poetic writing prompt. This week’s photo is courtesy of Molly Hogan, who is an amazing photographer/ poet/ teacher in Maine. She has sent me a few photos for this weekly prompt. (If you would like to offer any photos, please send me an email. You will get credit, but the photos will be free for reuse.)

In keeping with Laura Purdie Salas’s 15 Words or Less prompts, I encourage you to write a quick short poem. To help build a supportive community, please comment on three poems with an encouraging response.

A soul in solitary
silence seeks
a soft whisper
of solace.
Margaret Simon, draft

Your turn. Leave your poem draft in the comments. Thanks!

Read Full Post »

After Dark Blog Tour

Posted in Blogging, Books, Poetry, Writing, tagged After Dark blog tour, David Harrison on February 24, 2020| 22 Comments »

What a pleasure to take part in the After Dark blog tour. After Dark is a picture book of amazing illustrations by Stephanie Laberis and intriguing poems by David Harrison. Publication date is tomorrow, Feb. 25th. Read more about David and his many books here.

David’s poems explore the lives of nocturnal animals. In the end pages you can find more information about each animal. With my students, I started with the end pages. I asked them to select two animals they were interested in. We read the facts and then the poem. “Look for ways the poet wove the facts in with poetic language.” We noticed elements like rhyming, slant rhyme, alliteration, repetition, and others.

This reading and talking piqued our interest in finding out more. I gave students the option to select the same animal or another one to research using Wonderopolis.

Breighlynn wanted to learn more about songbirds. Earlier in the week we had discussed allusion and at the beginning of the month, we read about Maya Angelou. I love seeing all of these lessons come together in Breighlynn’s poem.

The song of a songbird
the morning alarm.
Their vibrant colors
just like a rainbow.
The smallest of birds
make the loudest of songs.
Now,
I know why the caged bird sings.
Breighlynn, 4th grade

After reading this David Harrison poem about the gray wolf, A.J. wrote a poem contrasting wolves to dogs.

Wolves,
never tamed,
they can’t be blamed.
Dogs,
youngly trained,
though restrained.
Wolves,
running free,
free as can be.
Dogs,
fun won’t end,
with man’s best friend.
A. J. , 6th grade

One of my students asked what was the word for animals who are awake during the day. On a Wonderopolis page, we discovered the word diurnal. In the poem, No Fooling (about the raccoon), David uses assonance, creating slant rhyme. I decided to try out this element in my own poem: Where do Birds Go at Night?

Where Do Birds Go at Night?
At first light, I hear their chatter
flitting about our courtyard feeder.
But once the air of dawn is gone,
I wonder where the birds have flown.
Most birds are diurnal
living their life all day,
but where do they go
once the sun goes down?
Only nocturnal birds hang around.
Some birds find a hole big enough to squeeze in.
Others, like the heron, want some mud to wade in.
Flocks of blackbirds roost in bunches
finding their nighttime safety in numbers.
Every time you go to sleep,
wonder where the birds may be.
Margaret Simon, draft 2020

This post is part of a blog tour. The publisher has offered a free book for comments on this post. I will draw at random from commenters and post the winner’s name on Friday, Feb. 28th on my Poetry Friday post. Please leave a comment by Thursday, Feb. 27th. Winner must live in the continental U.S.

Check out other posts to hear more about this book.

Writing and Illustrating
Beyond Literacy Link
Read, Learn, and be Happy
Poetry for Children
Teacher Dance
Michelle Kogan
Salt City Verse

Read Full Post »

Poetry Friday: Song of the Sacred

Posted in Poetry, Poetry Friday, Writing, tagged Joyce Sidman on February 21, 2020| 8 Comments »

Poetry Friday round-up is with Cheriee at Library Matters.

An Invitation: With Laura Purdie Salas’s blessing, I’ve started a weekly writing prompt for Thursdays in the spirit of 15 words or less. Pop over to read the poems this week about a pretty pink thistle: This Photo Wants to be a Poem.

This week my students and I read Joyce Sidman’s poem in the December issue of Scope magazine: Song of Bravery. There were a few things to notice in her poem, allusion and irony. When one normally thinks of a song, it’s something positive and praising. Joyce Sidman’s poem stated the opposite.

This one’s not a sure thing.
I’m not bound to win.
I don’t think I’ll ace it this time.
I won’t break a leg,
make my own luck,
or reach the stars.
Joyce Sidman, Song of Bravery from What the Heart Knows
read the whole poem here.

After Joyce, I wrote Song of the Sacred.

I am not a barefoot Buddha.
I cannot think and become.
I’m not singing rhyming psalms
in the present moment.

When I fall on my knees, they hurt.
I have no burnt offerings
or holy incense to light.

Maybe I pray with open hands
or maybe someone prays for me.
I’ll never know.

But here I am
stretched in savasana
humming an Om
with my eyes closed tight

Breathing to clear my mind
from the shadows of a cloudy day
to see the holy sun.
Margaret Simon, draft