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?