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Posts Tagged ‘Michelle Kogan’

Poetry Friday round-up is with Linda at A Word Edgewise.

    Today I am posting with the “Poetry Sisters” (Tricia Stohr-Hunt, Sara Lewis Holmes, Kelly Ramsdell, Laura Purdie-Salas, Liz Garton Scanlon, and Andi Sibley) who challenged the Poetry Friday community to write zentangle poems. If you are unfamiliar with this form, check out this post by Kat Apel.

I have done zentangle before but I’ve never been satisfied with the results. I got a card in the mail from Jone MacCulloch along with a plaque print of her amazing collage response for our Spark exchange. Jone’s card inspired me to try again with a mentor to emulate.

Zentangle by Jone MacCulloch
From Preservation, Spring 2021
Object Lesson
dig
over
enslaved
pieces
a tea bowl
lives
on

This week I received a wonderful summer poem swap gift from Michelle Kogan. Michelle is a watercolor artist in Chicago. She saw posts from me about our wood duck nest boxes and “Jump Day.” I admit to teary eyes when I saw her painting and poem. So special. She sent me a print as well as a homemade notebook with the painting on the cover and poem on the back. I have been writing poems about the wood duck experience and now I have a special place to write them. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks!

I love how Michelle’s poem captures the essence of Joy we feel when we see the ducks jump from their nest box.

Summer Poem Swap is organized by Tabatha Yeatts

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Poetry Friday round-up is with Carol at Carol’s Corner
Anhinga by Michelle Kogan

Who knew the anhinga could be a beautiful bird, but through the artistic eyes of Michelle Kogan, it is. I love this painting she sent me for the Summer Poetry Swap (organized by Tabatha Yeats). And she wrote a poem dispelling the myth that this is a “devil bird.”

poem and art by Michelle Kogan

ANHINGA

Devil bird–
Not I, look in my
lichen-like
eyes. I’ll wait
while wings dry, for kindness to
cleanse rumors and lies.

Michelle Kogan (c) 2019

Kindness cleanses me with this wonderful poem. We look at nature and can see ugliness or beauty. We can find danger or kindness. Michelle reminds me that rumors and lies are not real; they are on the surface. When we look deeper, we find beauty and kindness. It’s there.

Thanks, Michelle, for this wonderful gift of art and poetry. Check out her work here: www.michellekogan.com, www.moreart4all.wordpress.com, www.MichelleKoganFineArt.etsy.com.

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National Poetry Month 2018

 

See more posts at Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life .

 

My students and I have been writing to Amy Ludwig VanDerwater’s daily prompts at The Poem Farm.  I usually write alongside my students, so some days I have three poems done because I teach 3 different groups of kids.  On Monday, when we were writing using word play, I started writing at school number one about bees.

Dawson, 4th grade, helped me think about rhymes.  He told me that bees carry pollen in their mouths and spit it back and forth with other bees until it becomes honey, thus “honey primers.”

I turned to bee research and RhymeZone.

At school number two, Chloe, 2nd grade, told me that a bee’s dance is called a waggle.  Google confirmed it.

Last month, I had a bee incident in my classroom at school number 2 that caused a curse word to come out of my mouth, thus “cursing singer.” This incident happened in March, so I sliced about it here.

My students responded with pleasure at my completed poem.  They exclaimed “Boomchakalaka.”  Great word play for the ending!

 

Bees
hullabaloo
on flowering trees
humming,
drumming,
buzz-strumming.

Bees
hokey-pokey
through pollen fields
persnickety climbers,
expert mimers
honey primers.

Bees
waggle-dance
in the hive
insect communication
tapping out dictation
pointing to a destination.

Bee–one bashful bee
squirming
in my hair
angry stinger
hand slinger
cursing singer.

Boomchakalaka!

I am writing ekphrastic poetry this month for National Poetry Month.  Michelle Kogan is an poet-illustrator I’ve met through Poetry Friday.  Usually I start with the image to inform the poem.  This poem came before the illustration, but I knew Michelle would have one that fit just right. Thanks, Michelle.

Towering Tulip by Michelle Kogan. Click image to see Michelle’s website.

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