J. Patrick Lewis: My Earth Day Guest

Happy Earth Day!

Veronica: A Small Gift from Earth

Photo by Amy LV

It is with great pleasure that I introduce my guest blogger today, former US Children's Poet Laureate (2011 - 2013)  and winner of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Award fpr Excellence in Poetry for Children...J. Patrick Lewis.

Take it away, sir!

J. Patrick Lewis

Photo by Robert Donaldson

As April is World Habitat Awareness Month as well as National Poetry Month, I thought I’d combine the two themes in one poem.

In fact, this poem, Make the Earth Your Companion, is the title of a gorgeous forthcoming book from Creative Editions, 2017. (I’ve seen the art by Anna and Elena Balbusso, sisters from Italy.) So I'm delighted Amy has given me a chance to share it pre-publication.

Make the Earth Your Companion

Make the Earth your companion.                    
Walk lightly on it, as other creatures do.
Let the Sky paint her beauty—she is always
                  watching over you.
Learn from the Sea how to face harsh forces.
Let the River remind you that everything will pass.
Let the Lake instruct you in stillness.
Let the Mountain teach you grandeur.
Make the Woodland your house of peace.
Make the Rainforest your house of hope.
Meet the Wetland on twilight ground.
Save some small piece of Grassland for a red kite
                  on a windy day.
Watch the Icecaps glisten with crystal majesty.
Hear the Desert whisper hush to eternity.
Let the Town weave a small basket of togetherness.
Make the Earth your companion.
Walk lightly on it, as other creatures do. 

© J. Patrick Lewis

If I’m asked to say what is the first thing to do if you want to be a poet, it’s simply this: Be a reader. Never trust anyone who writes more than she or he reads. (Thanks to Samuel Johnson for that quote over 200 years ago.)

Start every day with a poem—and end it with a poem. 

Read poetry out loud, even if you are all alone in a room.

• Poetry is song. Poetry predates books and the alphabet. 
• Reading good poetry aloud resonates through your entire body.

Imitate other poets.

• Imitation is not plagiarism. Remember: You are not writing for publication; you are writing for practice.
• Choose your favorite poems and write parodies of them.

Thank you so much, Pat, for joining us today.  It is a privilege to share this space with you and a delight to read your wise and beautiful poem celebrating our planet.

Jama is hosting today's Poetry Friday roundup over at Jama's Alphabet Soup with a beautiful and delicious celebration of one of my favorite new books.  Enjoy all of the offerings, and please join in as you wish!

I will be back later today with Wallow in Wonder 22!

And in the meantime, in celebration of Earth Day, I am hosting an Earth Day giveaway of FOREST HAS A SONG on Twitter.  Please find me there at @amylvpoemfarm to enter.

xo, 

Amy

Please share a comment below if you wish.

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

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

Day 22 - National Poetry Month 2015 - Sing That Poem!

Happy National Poetry Month!

Welcome to Day 22 of this Year's Poem Farm Project!

Find the Complete April 2015 Poem and Song List Here

First, I would like to welcome all old and new friends to The Poem Farm this April. Spring is a busy time on all farms, and this one is no exception.  Each April, many poets and bloggers take on special poetry projects, and I'm doing so too.  You can learn all about Sing That Poem! and how to play on my April 1st post, where you will also find the list of the whole month's poems and tunes as I write and share them.  If you'd like to print out a matching game page for yourself, you can find one here, and during April 2015, you'll be able to see the song list right over there in the left hand sidebar.

Yesterday's poem was Cool as You Are.  Here is the tune that goes along with it, below. Did you figure it out?

Welcome again to Margaret Simon's students - Emily and Kielan -  from Caneview Elementary in New Iberia, Louisiana.  Well done, you crazy singing pair!

And here, below, is today's poem.  Look at the song list in the sidebar or on your matching form to see if you can puzzle out which tune matches this one.  If you have been playing along all month, I imagine this is getting much easier, isn't it?  I welcome all classes to send their own audio clips to me through SoundCloud (easy free app), and I will be tickled to post them here on The Poem Farm.

Earth Day Goodness

Photo by Amy LV

Students - Happy Earth Day!  Today, no matter the weather, I hope that you will spend some time outside enjoying the magic and mystery of nature - in the city, in the suburbs, in the country.  Look at a pigeon, listen to the peepers, sketch those gorgeous clouds.  We are very lucky to live on this gorgeous, glorious planet.

For today's poemsong, I decided to really lean on the repetition of lines.  I wanted this to have a very lullaby-easy-to-sing feeling, to celebrate all of the ways we can honor Earth both today and every day.  As I wrote it, I imagined that this could be a fun little play...or that others might write successive verses.  It is a simple tune, with a simple pattern and simple words.  You can sing it below.  Those words in capital letters have the strong beat, so be sure to sing those with a bit more emphasis.

If any classes do write a new verse, I welcome you to share it with me...and I will share it here!

In honor of Earth Day, I will give away three copies of my first book FOREST HAS A SONG (Clarion/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013) today.  One copy will go to a commenter here on today's post, one will go to a person who retweets my announcement on Twitter, and one will go to a commenter on the announcement on my Poem Farm Facebook page.  If you already have the book, I will be happy to sign and mail it to someone else should you win.

Happy Earth Day!  

xo, a.

Learn More About My First Book Here

Please share a comment below if you wish.

Daily Objects Help Us Remember

Happy Earth Day! 

I feel very lucky that my friend Tabatha Yeatts is featuring one of my nature-y poems and a few poemlinks at her rich and wonderful blog The Opposite of Indifference today.  Tabatha also directs us to a few very inspiring sites which offer ideas for honoring our Earth.  Thank you so much, Tabatha!

Welcome to Day 22 of Drawing Into Poems, my daily drawing/seeing/writing study into poetry.  You can read more about this month-long project here on my April 1 post.  Feel free to read the books with me and pull out your own sketchbook and jewelry box full of metaphor too...

Day 22 - The Iron

Click to enlarge the picture.

Students - Today's sketch is not of something I find particularly beautiful or inspiring, but it is about something useful and modern: an iron.  I'm not a big ironer, but sketching this hotel room iron reminded me of a story from my family's history.

When my grandparents (on my mom's side) were newly married, my grandfather complained about the way my grandmother ironed his clothing, saying that she "didn't do as fine of a job as his own mother had done."  Well.  You know what my grandma did?  She never ironed another piece of his clothing again!  I love this story of my strong lady grandmother from way back in the mid-1920s.  Stories like this help me understand the women from my past, and they help me feel strong too. Old family stories like this help us understand who we are.

Ask someone in your family to tell you an old story.  You might look at photographs and ask about the people, or ask if there is an old story that your mom or dad or aunt or uncle heard over and over again. Or look at an old passed-down object like a watch or a toy or a book and ask..."What is the story behind this?"  Then...write.

I am honored to be presenting later today on a poetry panel with Sylvia Vardell, Janet Wong, and Joyce Sidman at IRA, and I am grateful for Clarion having sponsored my wonderful trip here and last night's glorious dinner.  Next week is the TLA conference, and I look forward to all I will learn there too.  What a lovely Poetry Month it has been.

Tomorrow (Tuesday) evening, I will be a guest of Wonderopolis for this month's #WonderChat celebrating poetry and wonder.  This is the chat rescheduled from last Monday evening, and I hope that you will be able to join us!

If you are interested in winning a copy of FOREST HAS A SONG (a good book for Earth Day), do check out the left-hand sidebar here where you will see four different blogs that are currently offering giveaways of the book.

Please share a comment below if you wish.

To find a poem by topic, click here. To find a poem by technique, click here.

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Poem #22, TV Turnoff #4, & Earth Day

 

Earth Day Eve 2010

Photo by Amy LV

Neither you nor I should spend any more time in front of screens than is necessary today.  Mother Earth is waiting...

Tomorrow is Poetry Friday.  Please come back to learn about some delightful poetry CDs and also a few thoughts about how rituals of poetry can deepen our classrooms and our lives.

(Please click on COMMENTS below to share a thought.)