Tag Archives: poetry

Cormorant Convention: NPM #10

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I had planned to write about a place I love, the beach, in line with the Verselove prompt. But then during my end-of-the-work-week beach walk this afternoon I noticed a cormorant standing on the beach. Cormorants aren’t really common beach birds and are not regular visitors to our local beach. So seeing them always send a shiver of concern up my spine. I worry that they are sick when I see them on the beach. Of course I took a few pictures and then continued my walk. Then, looking out at the waves (good sized today) I noticed the tons of birds in the water…I thought they would be pelicans. That would be usual. But no, they were cormorants! They bounced with the waves. Some flew by and others were making their way out of the surf and parading toward the beach. It was obviously a cormorant convention! What brought them? I have no idea. Maybe a delicious delicacy in the waters? Or maybe simply a need to commune on the beach or the hope of catching a glimpse of the Artemis II spacecraft on its way to splashdown?

Cormorant Convention

They ride the waves

like pepper sprinkled on avocado

bobbing in the salty sea

They’ve arrived for the convention

making their way to the shore

waddling, bird by bird

to join the others

gathered

maybe to witness history

the splashdown of Artemis II

into the nearby sea

@kd0602

Alliterative Play: NPM26 #7

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A playful prompt from Verselove: pick a photo and begin and end with alliteration. When our garden teacher brought this delightfully huge lacy looking cauliflower into the lounge, I had to snap a photo. And the poem is some fun word play.

Wild white wonderful

cauliflower vegetably 

meandering through the school garden

growing to enormous proportions 

wandering wistful wondering

Am I a veggie kids will embrace?

Playing with Opposites: NPM26 #5

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I love to visit bookstores, so earlier this week while I was on Oahu I came across da Shop, a wonderful eclectic bookstore with so many fun books to browse (and buy). I was on the verge of buying this interesting picture book about the Japanese poet Basho called, A Pond, A Poet, and Three Pests by Caroline Adderson. It’s a cute story imagining what Basho was experiencing when he created his famous Haiku:

Old pond–

Frog jumps in

Splash!

Or some version of that. There are many different translations. Today’s poetry prompt at Verselove suggests creating an un-found poem or an Antonymic (one using antonyms) version. While I’m not so sure I actually followed the directions, I did have fun playing around with my own Haiku-ish poem inspired by Basho’s The Old Pond.

Human-filled beach

Modern pterodactyl lands

Air becomes breath

@kd0602

Great Blue Heron

Questions and Answers: NPM26 #4

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What’s your job?

No matter who asks:

     doctor

     cashier

     insurance agent

     random stranger in the elevator 

I answer

     teacher

What grade?

The standard follow-up.

First grade

The inevitable unchanging single syllable 4-letter response is

Cute

They can be. 

They’re also:

feisty and opinionated 

timid and uncertain 

liars and painfully honest

hilarious and NOT!

surprising and predictable 

constant conundrums

consumingly curious

cautiously certain

ferociously feral

frustrating

funny

fabulous 

They learn 

even when they’re trying not to 

mostly they sink their teeth 

(the ones that aren’t falling out)

into your heart

and never let go. 

That’s my job. 

What’s yours?

Nature’s Art: NPM26 #3

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When the day dawns cloudy and you have a sunset event planned, dreams of color fade to black and gray. Rain teased, moments of downpour mixed with fizzled drizzle. Nothing to keep you inside or suggest storm. Jacket nor umbrella made their way to into the day’s supplies. Time nears and the sun makes a path through the maze of clouds, an unexpected guest appearance.

After clouds and rain

shave ice spilled, pouring

colors you can taste

In Search of a Poem: NPM26 #2

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Here raindrops tap a daily rhythm

singing out

on windshields and foreheads 

cooling and greening

I want to pack my pockets 

with these watery tunes

hold them close

take them home

across the sea with me

Throw them high over my head

release them

let them

sprinkle

skitter

spit

saturate 

slip

slide

soak

spray

splash

seep

sing out

offer

daily green

           softly

           warmly…

Seascape: NPM26 #1

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30 poems in 30 days? Here goes…

Thanks to Verselove for the inspiration.

I. Inside me flows

salty Pacific waters

always moving, never still

etching their way from 

head to heart, calling

my name

II. Misty mornings wake me

dampen my face, painting

monochromatic shadows that

smell of sea funk

rust tracing the rivers

where salt spray never dries

III. Waiting for evening sky bursts

colors beyond imagination 

when juicy languid reds trickle into

luscious oranges that tickle the nose 

yellows so tart your taste buds pucker

sensory feast worth hungry gray days

IV. Inside me lives a liquid map 

surrounded 

by desert where fires flare,

water is precious, beauty goes deeper

than the eye can see

roots spread to quench their thirst

V. seeking connections 

VI. My pen yearns for words

to plant seeds deep underground 

to protect my lifeblood and yours

Earth’s waters

That flow in us all

Spring, the First Grade Version

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On this first day of spring (or is actually the 4th day of summer?), I shared Raymond Souster’s poem aptly titled, “Spring” with the first graders in my class. I could hear them murmuring…that’s not a poem, it’t too short! This poem, made up of two short sentences, was perfect for this last day of parent conference week.

Our typical process with a weekly poem is that I read it aloud first, then students repeat the lines of the poem after me, and then they contribute what they have noticed. Today with this lovely short poem (maybe as short as our winter), I invited students to volunteer to read the poem aloud. So many volunteer readers at this time of the year, we heard the poem in voice after voice. (It’s about rain and roots meeting in a flower). Students noticed the two stanzas, the two sentences, a few even counted out the words. They recognized the science in the first stanza and the metaphor in the second. They even pointed out some phonics-related vowel patterns in the words. They illustrated the poem and added it to their ever growing poetry anthology.

After recess I asked them to write a description of spring using metaphorical thinking. Actually, we had practiced some of these orally earlier in the day, and they were so confident then that I asked them to write three metaphors for spring (on the hopes that they would be varied and more interesting as they pushed past their first attempt). I handed them each a large index card and asked them to write their metaphors. A calm settled, and of course a few students asked if they could write more than three.

I’m counting this as a success when not a single student expressed doubt or mystery about what I was asking them to do…and that everyone easily wrote more than one spring-inspired metaphor. I collected their metaphors and picked one from each child to produce a collaborative Spring Is… metaphor poem.

And on yesterday’s neighborhood walk I couldn’t resist stopping to take a photo of this flower beginning to unfurl–a metaphor of spring in a photo for me!

What would you contribute to this collaborative metaphorical collection about spring?