tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52485525690260564412024-02-20T04:44:03.715-08:00Poem a DayRobin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-8279734184417993382013-01-07T18:45:00.002-08:002013-01-07T18:45:46.681-08:00January 7th<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, 'lucida sans', helvetica, geneva, sans-serif; width: 100%px;"><tbody>
<tr><td colspan="2" valign="top"><pre><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/16585">I Belong There</a></span></pre>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">by Mahmoud Darwish</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">translated by Carolyn Forché and Munir Akash</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I belong there. I have many memories. I was born as everyone is born.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I have a mother, a house with many windows, brothers, friends, and a prison cell</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">with a chilly window! I have a wave snatched by seagulls, a panorama of my own.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I have a saturated meadow. In the deep horizon of my word, I have a moon,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">a bird's sustenance, and an immortal olive tree.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I have lived on the land long before swords turned man into prey.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I belong there. When heaven mourns for her mother, I return heaven to</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> her mother.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">And I cry so that a returning cloud might carry my tears.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">To break the rules, I have learned all the words needed for a trial by blood.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I have learned and dismantled all the words in order to draw from them a </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> single word: <i>Home. </i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-size: xx-small;">rom </span><i style="font-size: x-small;">Unfortunately, It Was Paradise</i><span style="font-size: xx-small;"> by Mahmoud Darwish translated and Edited by Munir Akash and Carolyn Forché with Sinan Antoon and Amira El-Zein. Copyright © 2003 by the Regents of the University of California.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><br /></i></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Okay, I'm cheating on this one. It would take a lot of patience, digging, and direct instruction for my kids to get into this poem. But I love it. I feel like this would be one of those poems that I read aloud and get blank stares from all of the kids and then groans when I start pontificating about the power of words. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">It really is a beautiful poem about what home means, and what it means to belong to a place, and to the memories you have there. Having just left my childhood home in St. Louis and coming back to my (grown-up?) home in Austin, it's a subject really on my mind. </span></td></tr>
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Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-89940412554512144762013-01-07T18:06:00.003-08:002013-01-07T18:06:54.199-08:00January 6th<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/19217">Those Winter Sundays</a></span><br />by Robert Hayden</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />Sundays too my father got up early<br /> and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,<br /> then with cracked hands that ached<br /> from labor in the weekday weather made<br /> banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.<br /> When the rooms were warm, he'd call,<br /> and slowly I would rise and dress,<br /> fearing the chronic angers of that house,</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br />
Speaking indifferently to him,<br /> who had driven out the cold<br /> and polished my good shoes as well.<br /> What did I know, what did I know<br /> of love's austere and lonely offices? </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, 'lucida sans', helvetica, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">Copyright © 1966 by Robert Hayden, from </span><i style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, 'lucida sans', helvetica, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Collected Poems of Robert Hayden,</i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, 'lucida sans', helvetica, geneva, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;"> edited by Frederick Glaysher</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">This is what I hear when I read this poem: the crackling of a fire and the creaking of a cold house. <i>Blueblack cold, cracked hands, chronic angers. </i>I'd read this poem aloud, then have students read along with me, to explore the ways that poets use sounds, rhythm, and alliteration to create imagery and to appeal to the five senses. I also think the theme of conflict between father and son is something that my kids could really latch onto -- that's something very sentient in their day-to-day lives.</span><br />
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-86067713518167808742013-01-07T17:38:00.002-08:002013-01-07T17:38:36.457-08:00January 5th<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">The Dawn</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">by <span style="background-color: white; text-transform: uppercase;">FEDERICO GARCÍA LORCA</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: white; text-transform: uppercase;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="translated">
<span class="author" style="color: #4d493f; display: inline-block; letter-spacing: 0.05em; text-transform: uppercase;">TRANSLATED BY <a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/stephen-spender" style="color: #043d6e; outline: none; text-decoration: initial;">STEPHEN SPENDER</a> AND <a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/j-l-gili" style="color: #043d6e; outline: none; text-decoration: initial;">J. L. GILI</a></span></div>
<div class="tab-content active" id="poem">
<div class="poem" style="background-color: white; color: #505050; font-family: Georgia; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin: 25px 0px 0px;">
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
The New York dawn has</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
four columns of mud</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
and a hurricane of black doves</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
that paddle in putrescent waters.</div>
<br />
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
The New York dawn grieves</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
along the immense stairways,</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
seeking amidst the groins</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
spikenards of fine-drawn anguish.</div>
<br />
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
The dawn comes and no one receives it in his mouth,</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
for there no morn or hope is possible.</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
Occasionally, coins in furious swarms</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
perforate and devour abandoned children.</div>
<br />
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
The first to come out understand in their bones</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
that there will be no paradise nor amours stripped of leaves:</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
they know they are going to the mud of figures and laws,</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
to artless games, to fruitless sweat.</div>
<br />
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
The light is buried under chains and noises</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
in impudent challenge of rootless science.</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
Through the suburbs sleepless people stagger,</div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
as though just delivered from a shipwreck of blood.</div>
</div>
<div class="credit" style="background-color: white; color: #7f7f7f; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding-top: 24px;">
"The Dawn" by Federico García Lorca, from THE SELECTED POEMS OF FEDERICO GARCÍA LORCA. Translated by Stephen Spender and J.L. Gili, copyright © 1955 by New Directions Publishing Corp.<br />
<br />
Source: <em id="source_9780811216227">The Selected Poems of Federico Garc�a Lorca</em> (New Directions Publishing Corporation, 1955)</div>
<div class="section" style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial; font-size: 12px; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 14px 0px 0px; padding: 0px 0px 14px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;">Although this would certainly be a challenging poem for middle school students, I've always thought it's a good idea to share poems from the range that's out there. I want them to see the possibilities, and explore language in ways they might not have been exposed to yet. Great examples of alliteration, personification, and metaphor worth going deep on. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;">Plus, it's got that beautiful kind of morbid angst that middle schoolers just <i>live</i> in. Perfect for a dreary morning. </span></div>
</div>
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-3031468561799684822013-01-06T07:37:00.001-08:002013-01-06T07:37:05.756-08:00January 4th<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://soniasanchez.net/poems/">6 haiku</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;">(for Elizabeth Catlett in Cuernavaca)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">1.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />La Señora<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />making us remember<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />flesh and wind</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">2.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />O how you<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />help us catch<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />each other’s breath</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">3.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />a woman’s<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />arms climbing with<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />colored dreams</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">4.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />Elizabeth<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />slides into the pool<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />hands kissing the water</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">5.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />i pick<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />up your breath and<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />remember me</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">6.<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />your hands<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />humming hurricanes<br style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />of beauty.</span></div>
<h4 style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sanchez, Sonia, from her new book <em style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"><a href="http://soniasanchez.net/2010/02/morning-haiku/" style="color: #999725; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: initial;" title="Morning Haiku">Morning Haiku</a></em>. Boston: Beacon Press, 2010.</span></h4>
<h4 style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></h4>
<h4 style="background-color: white; font-size: 13px; margin: 0px 0px 15px; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">A beautiful, non-traditional way to teach haiku, and the beauty of saying something very powerful with very few words. </span><span style="color: #333333;"> </span></span></h4>
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-56917303490293284172013-01-05T09:56:00.000-08:002013-01-05T10:04:17.218-08:00January 3rd<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/178521">Apologies to All the People in Lebanon</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">by June Jordan</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="poem" style="background-color: white; color: #505050; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin: 25px 0px 0px;">
<div class="epigraph" style="margin-bottom: 25px; margin-left: 25px;">
<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Dedicated to the 600,000 Palestinian men, women, and children who lived in Lebanon from 1948-1983.</span></i></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I didn’t know and nobody told me and what </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">could I do or say, anyway?</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They said you shot the London Ambassador </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">and when that wasn’t true </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">they said so</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">what</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They said you shelled their northern villages</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">and when U.N. forces reported that was not true</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">because your side of the cease-fire was holding</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">since more than a year before</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">they said so</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">what</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They said they wanted simply to carve</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">a 25 mile buffer zone and then</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">they ravaged your</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">water supplies your electricity your</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">hospitals your schools your highways and byways all</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">the way north to Beirut because they said this</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">was their quest for peace</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They blew up your homes and demolished the grocery</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">stores and blocked the Red Cross and took away doctors</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">to jail and they cluster-bombed girls and boys</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">whose bodies</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">swelled purple and black into twice the original size</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">and tore the buttocks from a four month old baby</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">and then</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">they said this was brilliant</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">military accomplishment and this was done</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">they said in the name of self-defense they said</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">that is the noblest concept</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">of mankind isn’t that obvious?</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They said something about never again and then</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">they made close to one million human beings homeless</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">in less than three weeks and they killed or maimed</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">40,000 of your men and your women and your children</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But I didn’t know and nobody told me and what</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">could I do or say, anyway?</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They said they were victims. They said you were</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Arabs.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They called your apartments and gardens guerrilla</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">strongholds.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They called the screaming devastation </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">that they created the rubble. </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Then they told you to leave, didn’t they?</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Didn’t you read the leaflets that they dropped </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">from their hotshot fighter jets? </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">They told you to go. </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">One hundred and thirty-five thousand </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Palestinians in Beirut and why </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">didn’t you take the hint? </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Go! </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">There was the Mediterranean: You </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">could walk into the water and stay </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">there. </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">What was the problem?</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I didn’t know and nobody told me and what </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">could I do or say, anyway?</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Yes, I did know it was the money I earned as a poet that </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">paid </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">for the bombs and the planes and the tanks </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">that they used to massacre your family</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But I am not an evil person </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">The people of my country aren't so bad</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You can expect but so much </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">from those of us who have to pay taxes and watch </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">American <small>TV</small></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">You see my point;</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I’m sorry. </span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I really am sorry.</span></div>
</div>
<div class="credit" style="background-color: white; color: #7f7f7f; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding-top: 24px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">June Jordan, “Apologies to all the People in Lebanon” from <em>Directed By Desire: The Collected Poems of June Jordan</em> (Port Townsend, WA: Copper Canyon Press, 2005). Copyright © 2005 by The June M. Jordan Literary Trust. Used by permission of The June M. Jordan Literary Trust, <a class="more link extlink lpad" href="http://www.junejordan.com/" style="background-image: url(http://www.poetryfoundation.org/images/arrow-extlink.gif); background-position: 0px 3px; background-repeat: no-repeat no-repeat; color: #045482; display: inline-block; margin-left: 2px; outline: none; padding-left: 15px; text-decoration: initial;" target="_blank">www.junejordan.com</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Source: <em id="source_1556592345">The Collected Poems of June Jordan</em> (Copper Canyon Press, 2005)</span></div>
<div class="section" style="background-color: white; margin: 14px 0px 0px; padding: 0px 0px 14px; text-indent: -16px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> Right now, I'm reading a book entitled <i>Habibi</i> by Naomi Shihab Nye, about a young girl named Liyana who moves with her family from their home in St. Louis back to Jerusalem, her father's childhood home. I've been trying to find books that address current events, political issues, and social justice, but that talk about them from a child's/young adult's perspective. The book is very moving, and puts the Israel-Palestine conflict into very human terms. </span></div>
<div class="section" style="background-color: white; margin: 14px 0px 0px; padding: 0px 0px 14px; text-indent: -16px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> This poem would be a great connector/extender to a group of older students having read <i>Habibi</i> in a book club. The structure is a little less accessible for the typical middle school student, but would pose a welcome challenge to advanced readers, or just students who really love poetry -- I promise they exist! </span></div>
<div class="section" style="background-color: white; margin: 14px 0px 0px; padding: 0px 0px 14px; text-indent: -16px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> I've also been planning my units with a sense of showing students that writing (and yes, poetry!) has applications in the real world. This poem is a great example of a poet using her writing to express a political opinion, and to get readers to think differently about an issue. I would even use this poem in a unit on persuasion, while discussing the different tools writers and people can use when they are trying to change someone's mind. </span></div>
<div class="section" style="background-color: white; margin: 14px 0px 0px; padding: 0px 0px 14px; text-indent: -16px;">
<br /></div>
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-50555644492220366192013-01-05T09:44:00.001-08:002013-01-05T09:44:23.423-08:00January 2nd<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/244376">Siblings</a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">by Patricia Smith</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div class="poem" style="background-color: white; color: #505050; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; margin: 25px 0px 0px;">
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<em><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Hurricanes, 2005</span></em></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<em><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></em></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<em><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></em></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Arlene learned to dance backwards in heels that were too high.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Bret prayed for a shaggy mustache made of mud and hair.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Cindy just couldn’t keep her windy legs together.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Dennis never learned to swim.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Emily whispered her gusts into a thousand skins.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Franklin, farsighted and anxious, bumbled villages.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Gert spat her matronly name against a city’s flat face.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Harvey hurled a wailing child high.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Irene, the baby girl, threw pounding tantrums.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">José liked the whip sound of slapping.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lee just craved the whip.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Maria’s thunder skirts flew high when she danced.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Nate was mannered and practical. He stormed precisely.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ophelia nibbled weirdly on the tips of depressions.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Philippe slept too late, flailing on a wronged ocean.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Rita was a vicious flirt. She woke Philippe with rumors.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Stan was born business, a gobbler of steel.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Tammy crooned country, getting the words all wrong.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Vince died before anyone could remember his name.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Wilma opened her maw wide, flashing rot.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<em><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></em></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">None of them talked about Katrina.</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">She was their odd sister,</span></div>
<div style="padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">the blood dazzler.</span></div>
</div>
<div class="credit" style="background-color: white; color: #7f7f7f; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px; margin-bottom: 30px; padding-top: 24px;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Patricia Smith, “Siblings” from <em>Blood Dazzler</em>. Copyright © 2008 by Patricia Smith. Reprinted by permission of Coffee House Press. www.coffeehousepress.org<br /></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Source: <em id="source_9781566892186">Blood Dazzler</em> (Coffee House Press, 2008)</span></div>
<span style="color: #505050; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;"> This would be a great text to show students how to read just below the surface of a poem, how there are often codes and hidden meanings behind the words a poet uses. Also, to remind them that they have to read everything the poet puts on the page to understand what s/he is trying to say. The first time I read through, I skipped the italicized <i>Hurricanes, 2005</i> and read the whole poem imagining it was about children, siblings, cousins. It wasn't until I reached the last stanza about Katrina that I started to realize the poem was about something else. </span><br />
<span style="color: #505050; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #505050; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;">Using this poem as the introduction to a unit themed around Hurricane Katrina would be a great hook to begin talking about the social justice implications of this tragedy. It's not entirely political, as lots of writing about Katrina is, so it's a little more accessible to start with.</span><br />
<span style="color: #505050; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #505050; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;">Also, it would be great to read this poem and then have students practice using personification to describe weather, especially using strong, active verbs and vivid adjectives. </span><br />
<span style="color: #505050; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: 16px; line-height: 24px; text-indent: -16px;"><br /></span>
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-41914140843542992122013-01-02T05:05:00.001-08:002013-01-02T05:05:21.785-08:00January 1st<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" style="background-color: white; font-family: verdana, arial, 'lucida sans', helvetica, geneva, sans-serif; width: 100%px;"><tbody>
<tr><td valign="top" width="80%"><h1 class="TITLE">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/22751">The Snow Fairy</a></span></h1>
</td><td align="right" colspan="2" nowrap="" valign="top"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"> </span></td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="3"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">by <a href="http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/25" style="text-decoration: initial;">Claude McKay</a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="3" style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2" valign="top"><pre><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>I</b>
Throughout the afternoon I watched them there,
Snow-fairies falling, falling from the sky,
Whirling fantastic in the misty air,
Contending fierce for space supremacy.
And they flew down a mightier force at night,
As though in heaven there was revolt and riot,
And they, frail things had taken panic flight
Down to the calm earth seeking peace and quiet.
I went to bed and rose at early dawn
To see them huddled together in a heap,
Each merged into the other upon the lawn,
Worn out by the sharp struggle, fast asleep.
The sun shone brightly on them half the day,
By night they stealthily had stol'n away.
<b>II</b>
And suddenly my thoughts then turned to you
Who came to me upon a winter's night,
When snow-sprites round my attic window flew,
Your hair disheveled, eyes aglow with light.
My heart was like the weather when you came,
The wanton winds were blowing loud and long;
But you, with joy and passion all aflame,
You danced and sang a lilting summer song.
I made room for you in my little bed,
Took covers from the closet fresh and warm,
A downful pillow for your scented head,
And lay down with you resting in my arm.
You went with Dawn. You left me ere the day,
The lonely actor of a dreamy play.</span></pre>
<pre><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">
</span></pre>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>This felt like the perfect poem for a New Year's Day -- snow settling in on the front lawn, memories of the past year inescapable, but prepared to face whatever 2013 has to come. It's beautiful and heartbreaking, about melting snow and lost love -- not exactly the things that will make this New Year bright, I suppose -- but something about it gives me hope.<br /> </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>Although Claude McKay was writing during the Harlem Renaissance, which means some of the language is less accessible for middle schoolers (they always get stuck on things like "stol'n" and "ere"), I think all it will take is a few reads for them to get used to the flow of this writing and get to the meaning. This would be a great poem to use when extending conversations about how poets use metaphors. </i></span></td></tr>
<tr></tr>
</tbody></table>
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-90422417709289037412013-01-02T04:55:00.000-08:002013-01-02T04:55:28.299-08:00List of Poets<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Here's my current list of poets I'll be pulling from for this project!</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>A</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ai</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Fadhil Al-Azzawi</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Elizabeth Alexander</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Agha Shahid Ali</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Samih Al-Qasim</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Maya Angelou</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>B</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Jimmy Santiago Baca</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Amiri Baraka</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Gerald Barrax</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Clara Barton</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Basho</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Edward Kamau Brathwaite</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Gwendolyn Brooks</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Derrick Weston Brown</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sterling Brown</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Marilyn Buck</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Linda Joy Burke</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>C</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Aime Cesaire</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ching-In Chen</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lydia Maria Child</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Frances Chung</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Chyrstos</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Wanda Coleman</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Jayne Cortez</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Robert Creeley</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Countee Cullen</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>D</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lam Thi My Da</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Mahmoud Darwish</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Kwame Dawes</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Carolina Maria de Jesus</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Emily Dickinson</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Linh Dinh</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Rita Dove</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Paul Laurence Dunbar</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>E</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Mart<span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;">ín Espada</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;"><b>F</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;">Sesshu Foster</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;">Robert Frost</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;"><b>G</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;">Nikki Giovanni</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="line-height: 23.383333206176758px;">Jaki Shelton Green</span></span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>H</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Alena Hairston</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Suheir Hammad</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Michael Harper</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Robert Hayden</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Kathleen Hellen</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Essex Hemphill</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Melanie Henderson</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Juan Felipe Herrera</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Nazim Hikmet</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Joseph C. Holly</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Cathy Park Hong</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Langston Hughes</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>J</b></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Honoree Fanonne Jeffers</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Habib Jalib</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Qiu Jin</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">James Weldon Johnson</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">June Jordan</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>K</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Myung Mi Kim</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Carolyn Kizer</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Nate Klug</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Yusef Komunyakaa</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>L</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Larissa Lai</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Pinkie Gordon Lane</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Li-Young Lee</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Eleanor Lerman<br />Federico <em style="background-color: white; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;">García </em>Lorca</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Audre Lorde</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">James Russell Lowell</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>M</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Fred Marchant</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Bernadette Mayer</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Anthony McNeill</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Tony Medina</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Harryette Mullen</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>N</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Howard Nemerov</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Pablo Neruda</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Duane Niatum</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Naomi Shihab Nye</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">O</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Jena Osman</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>P</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Octavio Paz</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Patrick Pearse</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Leonard Peltier</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Willie Perdomo</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Craig Santos Perez</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Pedro Pietri</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Q</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Fernando Quijano III</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>R</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Barbara Jane Reyes</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Yonis Reuf</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Adrienne Rich</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Yannis Ritsos</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Jose Rizal</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Artemio Rodriguez</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Muriel Rukeyser</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Rumi</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>S</b></span></div>
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<em style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Raúl Salina</span></em><br />
<em style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sonia Sanchez</span></em><br />
<em style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Carl Sandburg</span></em><br />
<em style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lydia H. Sigourney</span></em><br />
<em style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Patricia Smith</span></em><br />
<em style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Mark Strand</span></em></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Rabindranath Tagore</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lorenzo Thomas</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Truth Thomas</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Natasha Trethewey</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>V</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Ocean Vuong</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>W</b></span></div>
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Rosmarie Waldrop</div>
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Frances E. Watkins</div>
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Phyllis Wheatley</div>
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John Greenleaf Whittier</div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Walt Whitman</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Shelley Anne Williams</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Miller Williams</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">William Carlos Williams</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: large;"><b>Y</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">John Yau</span></div>
Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5248552569026056441.post-83674399878609863002012-12-26T14:31:00.000-08:002012-12-27T09:39:44.000-08:00Greetings, Everyone!<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;">I am a teacher-activist in Austin, TX trying to become more intentional about what I read. I've gotten really good at balancing fiction and nonfiction, social justice readings and fluffly young adult novels, books by men and women, people of color, queer authors, as well as the classic canon. This variety means I've been able to introduce my students to a variety of authors and ideas. Our favorites from the past year include Sandra Cisneros, Howard Zinn, Majora Carter, Naomi Shihab Nye, Malinda Lo, Walter Dean Myers, Rudolfo Anaya, Sharon M. Draper, Zoe Weil, Michael Pollan, and David Levithan. I've also worked really hard to compile text sets that address many of the greatest social justice issues of our time -- my classes are especially interested in environmental justice, human trafficking, and immigration. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><i>I believe that to be a good teacher of reading and writing, I must also be a reader and writer in practice; I must read widely and reflect on that reading to better foster conversations about literature with my students.</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sifting through the list of books I've read in 2012, I noticed one genre that was ostensibly missing: <b>poetry</b>. In fact, I'm positive that the only poems I read in 2012 were the same poems passed down to me last year for curricular use during our poetry unit. Most of those poems are well-established in the canon of literature -- Dylan Thomas, William Shakespeare, Edmund Spenser, etc. Although several poets of color were included (Langston Hughes and Maya Angelou were heavily featured), I remember being upset with the lack of diversity in the resources given us to share with our extremely diverse student body -- but I also remember being totally distracted by my first year of teaching to do very much digging. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">This year, I plan to be prepared. After creating a list of poets and a collection of poems, starting <b>January 1st</b> I'll be sharing one poem a day on this blog, along with my thoughts and reflections. Your suggestions for poets and/or poems to add to my list are welcomed and appreciated!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Thanks for your support and readership this year! Looking forward to exploring some beautiful poems together. </b></span>Robin Lanehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06330807475710475258noreply@blogger.com0