Have you ever written an etheree? I hadn’t–and hadn’t even heard of this particular poetic form until I came across the book Thanku: Poems of Gratitude by Miranda Paul. As I read I came across a poem–an etheree-All This by Liz Garton Scanlon. A poem that begins with one syllable and builds one syllable at a time until it reaches ten syllables in line ten. In All This, Scanlon shows appreciation and gratitude for a small pleasure (or maybe a collection of small pleasures)…the snow, a book, a bubble bath, a cat…
Coming back from our winter break in early January, this seemed like a perfect alternative to resolution making and would ease us all back into writing and reading and thinking and planning. So, in #collaboration with Liz Garton Scanlon, my students and I embarked on some etheree writing…and finally…today, I got their finished Postcards to Myself up on the classroom wall!
It feels like serendipity that this culmination coincided with the #clmooc poetry port invitation #collaboration! I love that I can celebrate my students’ poetry and the power of a mentor text…and my own poem too.
And here is a a closer view of a couple of student creations (8 and 9 year olds)…the first by H:
Bone
Skull
Fossil
Dinosaur
Bones in the ground
Brushing off the dust
Prehistoric fossils
Putting on the soft plaster
Breaking the hard rock to find bone
T-Rex has a small name but it’s huge
Fossils are everywhere in the world.
And another by B:
The Art of Folding Origami
Fold
sharp ends
crisp paper.
Origami
the art of folding
take your time, be precise
make sure you use square paper.
I can fold cranes, swords, hats, and more
fold until your run out of paper
origami is hard, so keep trying.
And my own:
Inhale
Beach
with sand
bright sunshine
cool frothy waves
and perky sea birds.
I walk and watch and shoot
camera ready, focused
helping me see the world clearly.
I have so much to be grateful for
and I breathe in: inhaling sea’s bounty.
®Douillard
Now it’s your turn to join in the collaboration! Will you try an etheree?
