The flowers I planted for the pollinators are loving all the rain we’ve been having. This one is called Red Hot Poker. Unfortunately, the stem weakened and it is now flopped over, but before that happened, I took this “portrait mode” photo.
I hope this invitation to write finds you in a place of peace. Please write a small poem in the comments and encourage others with your responses.
For each photo poem, I give myself a challenge. Today, I am trying a triolet. It is a poem of eight lines in which line one repeats in lines 4 and 7, line two repeats in 8. The rhyme scheme is abaaabab.
Red Hot Poker Triolet
Torch lily towers and shines for the day will be hot and wet. Butterflies float to its wine. Torch lily towers and shines. Summer firecracker’s a sign: sweet nectar steams like a jet. Torch lily towers and shines for the day will be hot and wet.
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
If you are a blogger and would like to add a line during National Poetry Month to our Kidlit Progressive Poem, please make a comment or send me an email with a date choice and a link to your blog. Everyone is welcome to play!
The early morning school playground was covered in a sheet of fog. Avalyn and I went outside to write. This is something she often requests. There is an old oak with a picnic table in a just right spot for writing in our notebooks. I wrote about my surroundings, observations of the morning.
The fog hovers over the playground. I hear echoes of a church bell chime. Traffic moves beyond carrying the day-workers. Birds call to mates as spring slowly wakes sprouting on this weary morning.
Form can give us a container for our words. I looked up the triolet form. I labeled my paper with the number of lines and the rhyme scheme. The poem changed shape while still holding the mood.
Fog hovers on soft spring air, tip-toes as a church bell chimes. Work day traffic moves on everywhere. Fog hovers on soft spring air. Breeze tickles my face with hair. Morning wakes right on time. Fog hovers on soft spring air, tip-toes as a church bell chimes.
(Margaret Simon, draft)
I used these two drafts to discuss revision with my students at the next school in the afternoon. I suggested they go back to a poem and revise it.
Max who is a humble poet will rarely share his poems out loud, so I asked his permission to share his revision here. He wrote it on Fanschool, and you can leave comments specifically for him there.
“Insects buzzing all around,
Bugs are feeding on the ground,
For there is no need for them to hurry,
So why should they need to worry?”
March 25th, 2025: I absolutely despise the quality of this poem. REVISE!
Insects hover in the air,
Gracefully, glide without care.
Spot a flower, beautifully white.
Harvesting energy, basking in the sunlight.
Insects, bugs, air and the ground.
Moving, flying, all around.
To hurry is not a worry, for them.
Unless by something, they’re found.
Then Scurry!
I would add something else, but this is just about it. (Max, 6th grade)
How do you approach revision? Is it hard for you? I think students don’t usually like to revise. They like to write and move on to the next thing. Honestly until I read Max’s post, I thought the class didn’t think much of my little revision lesson. Modeling our own writing process with our students makes us vulnerable, but in the long run, shares how we all are in this together, writing side by side.
I’ve been participating in VerseLove over at Ethical ELA. Today, Fran Haley invited us to write a triolet. This is a form I find challenging because the repeated lines, while they should be easy, make it hard to create an original poem in which the flow doesn’t seemed forced.
I love nature and observing the intimacy of birds. Recently I witnessed a cardinal couple feeding. Such a sweet moment to see the male feeding the female. In case you are wondering, I intentionally changed the last line to play with metaphor.
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 with Ruth at There is not such thing as a God-forsaken Town.
My drive to my schools changes with the seasons. In fall, the sugarcane is tall and takes my attention. In spring, these fields are fallow, and some become meadows of golden wildflowers. Horses roam. I wish I had taken a picture, but I’m usually on a strict time schedule.
Last week my student Chloe and I played with the triolet form, inspired by this Irene Latham poem, Triolet for Planting Day. It was a more challenging form than I thought it would be.
Triolet for Field and Breeze
When Field awakens to glimmering gold, Breeze gallops upon green waves. An ember mare nuzzles her foal when Field awakens to glimmering gold, and readies itself for a front of cold, with frolics over winter’s graves. When field awakens to glimmering gold, Breeze gallops upon green waves.
Thank you to Two Writing Teachers for creating an amazing community of writers and a safe, welcoming space to write and share.
We have rubber boots for both boys. Here, Leo helps Tuffy put on his boots for our walk. Charlie looks on.
On Sunday morning, I was in charge of my two grandsons, both 2 years-old, 9 months apart. We started out with a goal of walking to CeCe’s house. CeCe lives on the next block about half a mile from my house. For the first little while, the walk was adventurous. The boys walked together, but then Tuffy (Thomas, T-monster, T-bird) trailed off into a field of tall grass. I had to fetch him out and in so doing, realized he had left a prize in his diaper. We had to go back home and change him.
Back on the road, each boy carried a skeleton hand. I got these plastic skeleton salad tongs at the dollar store last year. They each had one tong, so no arguments or need for “sharing.” Every once in a while Tuffy would want Leo’s, and they would trade. When Leo discovered that banging on the gutter caused a loud percussion, the boys pounded out a rhythmic tune that echoed across the quiet stillness of Sunday morning.
Moving on, Leo saw another gutter, “Look, another one!”, but I said, “Let’s keep moving. It’s a long way to CeCe’s house.” I called CeCe, and she told me she would be going to church at 10:30. This was 9:30, so I told her we would just stop for 5 minutes. I estimated we’d get there by 10. Well, not so much.
I put Thomas in the stroller which he cried about, but once I started singing, he was OK. I was making up songs right on the spot. It went something like this, “We are marching, marching, marching to the Frankenstein.” I promised we would get to see the humongous Frankenstein statue on the next block.
I texted CeCe when we hadn’t made it to her street by 10:00. “We’ll have to see you later.” Then I ran into some friends out for a morning run. We stopped to talk. It’s funny how my toddlers were very talkative until someone asked them a question.
We finally made it to Frankenstein. I called Katherine who was just out of the shower after her run with Papère. She came with her car and picked us up or I may still be out there coaxing these boys along with a drum and a song.
Frankenstein with Leo, left, Thomas, right.
Walking with a Toddler
I open my eyes to your wonder as you discover everything new– a fallen limb, a world over and under. I open my eyes to your wonder, reach for your hand at the sound of thunder, follow your gaze, engage your view. I open my eyes to your wonder as you discover everything new.
Margaret Simon, draft triolet
I am joining a daily writing of gratitude poems for the month of November. Three lines a day.
The Christmas rush has finally settled, and Charlie and I have found solace in the sofa with warm fleece blankets, a cup of tea, and a guilty pleasure rom com on Netflix. I needed this day of rest.
I did spend some time catching up on Cybils reading and doing laundry. There’s always laundry. But for the most part, I’ve taken it easy.
Thinking ahead to the new year coming, I love the idea that there is space for seeds to grow. On the Smack Dab in the Middle blogspot, Deb Calhoun wrote:
“Two days past winter solstice, when the days inch longer and the nights shorter, this is the time when imagination reignites. All that has been hidden, sleeping and growing in the dark Underland, begins to emerge. Tendrils of light shoot up like tiny seedlings poking their heads from the dark. They find light and see what the wind says.”
Deb suggests we pay attention to the budding of imagination and creativity. Whenever I have the time to relax, I feel the energy of creativity. I wish I could cultivate it every day, but when lessons have to be made and the house has to be ready, I get weary and unimaginative.
Today I am off to visit my parents in Mississippi, but before this winter school break ends, I hope I find another day to rest and wait for new ideas to germinate.
Sheri is hosting the round up today at her site, Sheri Doyle
In our district (in Louisiana, we call them parishes), our gifted students are spread across the parish in a dozen schools. In order to bring together our 6th grade students the year before they go to middle school together, we designed an enrichment program. The 6 elementary gifted teachers meet with all the 6th graders for one day a month to work on a specific real world project. This year our theme has been water, and I lead them in a poetry exercise each month.
This month I got the idea of using the triolet form from fellow Poetry Friday blogger, Joy at Poetry for Kids Joy. Last week, she posted a few triolet poems she wrote using quotes about writing. So I searched for quotes about water. The students’ handout included the directions for writing a triolet and a list of quotes about water. I asked them to choose a quote and use it as the first line of the poem. The best part about this exercise was I wrote with the students, and we did 5 small group rotations, so I wrote 5 triolet poems. I will only post my two favorites here.
Snow Day from Linda at Teacher Dance.
Snow Day
Someday we’ll evaporate together,
But today we’ll play in the snow.
Someday we’ll ignore the weather,
But today we’ll slip and flow.
Like two birds of the same feather,
we’ll talk and laugh and glow.
Someday we’ll evaporate together,
But today we’ll play in the snow.
–Margaret Simon, all rights reserved
Clean
Be like water, float.
Let bubbles wash you like soap.
Dance on waves, forget the boat.
Be like water, float.
Find a bottle, read the note,
Wonder, dream, imagine, hope.
Be like water, float.
Let bubbles wash you like soap.
Margaret Simon lives on the Bayou Teche in New Iberia, Louisiana. She teaches gifted elementary students, writes poetry and children's books. Welcome to a space of peace, poetry, and personal reflection. Walk in kindness.
Reflections on the Teche 