Today I pulled out the paint chips poetry box and spread paint chips all over the counter (face down). Students picked out 3, wrote the descriptive color words at the top of their notebooks and got ready to write! There were a few challenging words (thistle, cumulonimbus, potpourri) and when one third grader pulled pinot noir I suggested he go ahead and trade that word in. The words push students in interesting directions, although most end up not really featuring color.

Today’s rain kept us indoors–and listening seemed to be locked outside the classroom. Maybe that was another reason for the direction my own poem wanted to go. I pulled the colors/words: smoke signal, graphite, and potpourri And here is where my brain took me:

Learning to Listen

Somedays communicating

feels like sending

graphite-colored

smoke signals

that disperse in the breeze

of talk

Listening is under-evolved

ears hearing only the echo

of self-talk,

lost in the potpourri

of loud, colorful words

Today I’m building a fire

that we must tend together

you read my smoke signals,

I read yours

as we strengthen our listening ears

tuning in

to the subtle graphite sounds

listening like owls

like wolves

like we care what is said.

®Douillard