Collect Colors & Surprise Yourself

 

The Sky's Clothes

by Amy LV

Students - Yesterday I had another joyful meeting with Mrs. Jermolowicz's students from Luther J Schilling School in Homer Glen, Illinois. We are connected through Kids Need Mentors which is a program that pairs educators and authors for year-long partnerships. When we meet, we read and write and share, and I look forward to each visit. They may share here someday!

Yesterday, we had sound troubles (my computer)...so we shared in the chat, and we wrote together kind of in silence. Our time together grew the poem I share today. Here's what we did, and here's how you can try it too. 

Divide a page in your notebook into four boxes as you see below. Somewhere in each box, write the name of a color that you have seen today. If you would rather choose your colors in a different way (favorites, colors that remind you of your grandfather, garden colors, lunch colors, what you're wearing colors), feel free. It just matters that you have a few color choices.

Then, take a few minutes to jot whatever comes to your head about any of the colors in its matching box, in any order you wish. You might write about all colors in order. You might stick with one. You might jump around.

See if you are given a line or two of a poem. I chose to stay simple and just revise my lines a little bit.

My Color Notes

Photo by Amy LV

It can be very helpful to try a little game like this to get your writing going. You can play such idea-generating games by yourself, with a friend, a group of friends, or a whole class. When our brains play and feel free, they can be very generous with ideas!

My next book, illustrated by the wonderful Emma Virj

án, enters the world next Tuesday, March 1! It is a celebration of Poem in Your Pocket Day, titled IF THIS BIRD HAD POCKETS, A POEM IN YOUR POCKET DAY CELEBRATION, and you can see the beautiful book trailer, made by the great folks at Wordsong/Astra Books for Young Readers. It's my third COVID book release (WRITE! WRITE! WRITE! in March 2020 and THAT MISSING FEELING in January 2021), and that has definitely been strange.

I feel so thankful to have collaborated on this book with Emma and everybody at Wordsong/Astra. I learned a lot along the way and was filled with such wonder as I wrote. Poem in Your Pocket Day is on April 22 this year, so you might want to mark your calendars and start choosing your own pocket poem.

Enjoy this trailer if you wish...

Tricia is hosting today's Poetry Friday roundup at The Miss Rumphius Effect with the results of an Exquisite Corpse game she played with some poet friends and also an upcoming poetry challenge called an ekphrastic doditsu (read the post to learn more!) Please know that all are welcome each Friday as folks share poems, poem books, poetry ideas, and friendship.

Happy color collecting!

xo,

Amy

Please share a comment below if you wish. 

If you are under 13 years old, please only comment with a parent

or as part of a group with your teacher and class.

Getting Dressed - Personification

Trees

by Amy LV

Click the arrow to hear me read this poem to you.

Students - I just found this today in a small pile of poems that never made it into my new book, FOREST HAS A SONG. This poem has a different style - a more formal style - than the rest of the book, and it was such fun to find it!  It is pretty strictly metered; you will notice that most lines have 10 syllables, some 9.  And there is a lot of personification here...the trees in this poem get dressed just like people do!

I have been talking a lot here about my new book, and it will be released tomorrow.  Thank you to everyone for all of your support and good wishes!  Here is the trailer that my wonderful husband Mark made for me.

Please share a comment below if you wish.

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