The children’s poetry community lost a friend and a mentor when Lee Bennett Hopkins died on August 8th. I never had the pleasure of meeting him, but in everything I’ve read about him, he was a gentle leader and proud father of poetry.
Among his many anthologies, I have Amazing Places on my classroom shelf. In it, Lee Bennett Hopkins collected poems about places around our country. His contribution was a poem titled Langston.
Though his professional writing was successful, it was the death of poet Langston Hughes in 1967 that proved to be a spark for Hopkins’s career of anthologizing poetry for children.
By Shannon Maughan | Aug 13, 2019
Amazing Places: Poems selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins, Lee & Low Books, 2015.
While borrowing a few lines as well as the form of this poem and reading his obituary on Publishers Weekly, I wrote this poem for Lee.
His Dusts of Dreams after Lee Bennett Hopkins “Langston” for Lee Bennett Hopkins, 1938-2019
Who would have known a young boy of divorce, a poor student inspired by a teacher would find his footing in education–
from student to teacher to collector of poems, With greetings to all Dear Ones, he left his dusts of dreams.
Christie Wyman has invited the Poetry Friday community to write about trees this week. I am back in school and have so missed the days of writing alongside my students. Because I am itinerant and teach at three schools, I have three opportunities to write during the day. That gave me time to write, read aloud, revise, write. Not to mention the joy my students felt to be back in the saddle of writing.
We used “That was Summer” by Marci Ridlon as a mentor text. The repetition makes this form an easy one to mimic. I chose to write about the different trees we see each season.
Seasons of Trees after Marci Ridlon “That was Summer”
Remember that time when the rope swing hung from the old oak tree the knot round and rough? You wrapped your skinny legs on tight let someone give you a push your head leaned back tongue out, tasting the breeze. That was summer.
Remember that time you gathered pecans plopping one by one into grandfather’s tin bucket? You held the brown nut to the metal cracker, and turned the handle until Crack! Tasting hickory butter sweetness. That was autumn.
Remember when the wind turned cold, Flakes fell softly on the trees, and you bundled up and walked with your sisters through rows and rows of Christmas spruce, playing hide and seek and searching for the just-right one. That was winter.
Remember how the warm sun rose on the Japanese magnolia prompting firm blossoms to open like helium-filled party balloons? Remember how you walked near to smell the strong rosy scent that could make you sneeze? That was spring.
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Thoughts and Prayers by Kelli Broussard Kaufman
When we don’t know what to say, art can speak for us. This painting was done by Kelli Broussard Kaufman. She’s a Lafayette artist I follow on Facebook. (Her parents are good friends and neighbors.) I asked her permission to post the image here, and she also told me about her process. Her playlist while painting included Simon and Garfunkel’s The Sound of Silence. Her art, the song, and her process notes inspired this poem.
In the sound of silence, we think no one cares. The words have all been said. Prayers are empty now.
Silence like a cancer grows. The wax burns, drips, soils the flag we want to save us. How many more?
In the naked light I saw a flicker of candles in the wind drawing strength from one another burning bright and singing out–
This is not who we are. This is not our story. We are one people. We are better than this.
Today my Sunday Poetry Swagger writing group is celebrating a new form invented by our colleague Heidi Mordhorst, who is hosting the PF link up.
Heidi’s definition of a definito is “a free verse poem of 8-12 lines (aimed at readers 8-12 years old) that highlights wordplay as it demonstrates the meaning of a less common word, which always ends the poem.” A few weeks ago during one of our Sunday night critique meetings, she asked us each to try writing our own definito.
I’ve been following Teach Write on Facebook and each day they post a word to jump start writing. In the month of July, they posted “voracious vocabulary”. One day the word was “zephyr.” This was a new to me word that I thoroughly enjoyed learning about. A definito is a great way to explore a word’s meaning through writing. I will be using this activity with my students this year.
Zephyr
Zero in. Feel the wind blow oh, so, slow, lightly feathering the sleepy moss, slightly rippling the shore. Not a gale or hefty gust, blustery bora or frigid buster. This Greek god is a gentle one waving from the western sky… easy-breezy zephyr. (draft) Margaret Simon
Poetry Friday round-up is here! Scroll down to link up.
Laura Purdie Salas started a sharing group on Facebook around the journal companion to Steal Like An Artistby Austin Kleon. One of the exercises asks you to steal a title to create your own story.
I recently attended an art show for my friend and SCBWI colleague, Denise Gallagher. The title of her show was “A Teaspoon and a Bit of String.” She is currently involved in an ArtSpark grant for her upcoming middle grade fairy tale. This is her title illustration.
A Teaspoon and a Bit of String by Denise Gallagher
I stole (like an artist) this title to write a poem. For a few weeks this summer I was cleaning out my parents’ home. They moved to a retirement home. I found treasures as I whittled through drawers and closets. A teaspoon and a bit of string fit just right.
A Teaspoon and a Bit of String*
We live in shared spaces thirty years or more storing things away for someday when you need a bit of string.
Tie it to your shoelace or round a simple gift. Hand it to your lover to remember you with.
Down in the abyss of the silverware drawer, a teaspoon speaks of years of sugar measured, perhaps the purple medicine to calm a cough.
I tuck this teaspoon into days-old news tie with a bit of string and carry it with me into next time.
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As I sit down to write this, there are 5 electric service trucks outside on my street and in my neighbor’s driveway. Hurricane Barry powered through over the weekend and took out a few branches. Nature’s way of tree trimming, but unfortunately, one of those limbs took out a transformer. We were only without power for 24 hours and thanks to a trusty, industrial generator, we didn’t suffer much. The guys working on the poles, clearing out the downed wires, and restoring electricity are heroes in my book. Many are not even from our area. They made the sacrifice to travel here in the wake of a major storm. We are grateful.
This summer my life has been busy in a different way from previous summers, no teacher workshops, no writing retreats, no foreign travel. I have not sliced in weeks because the topic feels too big for a small slice.
My parents moved to a retirement home. This is good news for many reasons. They made the decision on their own, and they are now in a place that feeds them good meals with a built in social life.
What needed to be addressed was the house they lived in for 29 years. This was not the home of my childhood, but it is the home of my children’s childhood. It was a place I took them to be loved. The house was on a lake where sunsets were glorious. My brother took my girls fishing on the dock. I watched herons and egrets and white pelicans. Sitting on the swing on the back porch was a favorite spot. Many family photos were staged there.
I’ve visited my parents every summer, so I looked back to blog posts written there. Here is a poem I wrote the summer of 2015.
Sometimes on the lake in June white pelicans fly in together and I get out the camera. Then they turn as a drum line in step, swim away swiftly in a cloud.
Sometimes on the lake in June a lone blue heron fishes. Sly step, long beak held high, drinking in the sunlight. A small boat passes by lines thrown out, catching nothing.
Sometimes on the lake in June, I wake before dawn, put the coffee on, Sometimes Dad will join me silent, reading the daily news. Mom comes in pleased to have fresh coffee. We sit on the porch, quiet content to be together on the lake in June.
(c) Margaret Simon
Sifting through the stuff of a house, the history of a life, is bittersweet. There were treasures to find, memories to share, and things to keep. My daughters and I have all taken things with us, but we will all miss the peacefulness and joy of the house on the lake.
Poetry Friday round-up is with Jone at Deo Writer.
Each summer I participate in Tabatha’s Summer poetry swap. Poetic gifts coming and going inspire me and uplift me.
My first swap came by way of email from Donna Smith. Donna has been busy selling her house in Maine and moving to Pennsylvania, so snail mail didn’t work for her. The method matters little when you receive a poetry gift. Here’s her poem for me.
poem by Donna Smith, 2019
My second gift was from Kay McGriff. She sent a notebook she had made by hand along with two bookmarks. Her poem for me is a golden shovel from a line I wrote on my blog during National Poetry Month. Both Donna and Kay included images from my life here on the bayou. I appreciate the time they took to read and learn and write a personal poem. We do this in the name of poetry love.
Golden shovel by Kay McGriff
Note about Tropical Storm Barry: Yes, we are in its path. We are ready. Our house is strong, and we have a generator named Sparky. All will be well. Thanks for your concern.
It’s Poetry Friday, and I don’t have a post prepared.
I followed links to CLMOOC, a summer gathering of writing project folks to stretch their thinking. Kevin Hodgson writes:
Here in CLMOOC, we’ve always actively pushed back on the “massive”. While MOOCs often were built to scale large, CLMOOC has often comfortably settled into the small. So, this July and August, we invite you to look closer at the world, to find balance with the small scale of things around you.
Kevin Hodgson
Kevin introduced a new term to me, feldgang.A feldgang is slowing down to notice something in a new or different way. This idea fascinates me. Poetry lends itself to feldganging (not sure if that is a real word.)
This morning I am combining feldgang with greenbelt writing, that writing that is wild and unpredictable and possibly of no real worth at all. A first draft of a poem while looking out my kitchen window:
The chickadees come to the feeder chick-a-dee-dee-deeing. They flitter their tiny bodies in the trees, and try to stay unnoticed, like butterflies to a bright flower.
I notice them and think of this simple act of feeding the birds, a small plastic feeder, some seed from a plastic bag.
I invite these small visitors to my kitchen window. I laugh at their tiny tweets. Begin my day with a lighter step.
He fell in love with the smooth flow of a pencil drawing beauty in lines becoming shapes becoming a feminine body on a 3×5 card.
I fell in love, too. Her face my child Self, that tender one I lost and seek to touch again. I hold her in my hand like a shell from an endless shore.
She knows how to love me. I am slowly learning how to be loved.
(draft) Margaret Simon, June 22, 2019 ekphrasis on drawings by John F. Simon
I wrote this poem at a writing workshop around John F. Simon’s art show at the Hilliard Museum. The first line was borrowed from Barbara Crooker’s ekphrastic poem on Van Gogh’s Field with Wheat Stacks published on The Writer’s Almanac on June 22, 2019.
The empty calendar of my summer has filled up leaving less time for writing. The cure for not getting exercise is to sign up for a class. So the cure for my lack of time to write was to sign up for a class.
At a local museum, The Hilliard, my friend Clare was offering a 3 hour writing workshop. I know from experience with Clare that she offers lots of empty space for real writing. We discussed our writing practices and our familiarity with ekphrastic writing (writing to an image). Then she sent us into the museum to the show of John F. Simon’s work.
I was immediately drawn to the piece in the photo above. It’s large, probably 5-6 feet across by 3-4 feet in width. The title of the work is Moment of Release. I love how the title really doesn’t dictate the interpretation. I gave in to this freedom to explore and released a poem.
Moment of Release
This collection of energy stored and sealed into a protective sheaf will one day open the well spilling contents of a life– rain it down like a delta flood releasing to a renewable Source.
Margaret Simon, (c) 2019
My advice to you is don’t wait for a workshop. Grab a writing buddy and head out to the nearest museum or gallery. If you take pictures, ask permission first. Gather words, images, sounds on the page to transform into a poem or prose. The poem I shared is only one of four I wrote in the hour we were given. I plan to give myself permission to take another artist date this summer. What about you?
Margaret Simon lives on the Bayou Teche in New Iberia, Louisiana. She is a retired elementary gifted teacher who writes poetry and children's books. Welcome to a space of peace, poetry, and personal reflection. Walk in kindness.
Reflections on the Teche 