Early This Morning - City Free Verse

Sidewalk Garden - Upper East Side of NYC

Photo by Amy LV

(I will add audio to this poem when I return home!)

Students - I am still in New York City, and there are so many beautiful and exciting things to see and think about.  I am once again reminded of the time I lived here, one part of the kaleidoscope of people living so many different and interesting lives.  

The picture of roses for sale on the streets of New York City is one of my favorite images, and each time I visit New York and pass these sidewalk gardens, my gaze lingers longer. We all have favorite images, and one of the grand things about writing is that it allows us to revisit those scenes and places and pictures again and again...in different ways.  Here is a roses-in-NYC-poem I wrote back in 2010.

This is a free verse poem, and the last part was the most difficult part for me to write.  I fell asleep trying to think of that line, took a shower trying to think of that line, stared out of the window trying to think of that line.  I am still not sure it will stay, but for now...it will do.

One of Several Pages of Draft

Photo by Amy LV

Cathy Mere is allowing us to peek inside of her (paper and digital!) notebooks at my other blog, Sharing Our Notebooks. If you are an upper grade teacher or notebook keeper, you will be interested in her journey, and I welcome you to stop by, read, enjoy, and enter Cathy's giveaway of some neat notebooking apps.

Tara, along with William Blake and wisdom, is hosting today's Poetry Friday joy over at A Teaching Life.  Please visit there to join all of us who love Poetry Friday, learning about new poetry places to visit, and perhaps sharing your own.

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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Two Flowers - Compare & Contrast

Rose and Dandelion
by Amy LV

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

Students - Today's poem grew from some scratchings in my notebook. A few months ago, I wrote many of the flower-spoken words you read above, but as I reread them and thought about Monday's post about Thistle and about the YA novel I am currently reading - UGLIES by Scott Westerveld - I realized that I am thinking a lot about freedom vs. captivity lately.  I'm not sure why that is, but when you are writing regularly, you can see patterns in your mind and heart.  That's why I keep a notebook - to know what I think!

When I scribbled the beginnings of this poem in my notebook, I only had the lines from the flowers, but as I continued to work on it, I decided it would be fun to "bookend" it with some thinking and a question, the stanzas in italics. One of my favorite poems is Alley Violinist by Robert Lax, and I especially like how it leaves the reader with a question.

In addition to having different voices, this poem uses a technique we call "personification" which means that the writer gives an object or animal human characteristics.  In this case, I let the flowers think and talk. (It's funny, though, because I think that they actually DO talk and it's not a poetic technique at all!) This poem is also a compare/contrast poem, juxtaposing the lives of two flowers.  

So...here are a few things to think about today:  keep your notebook and save those thought-treasures, consider writing something that compares two different things, listen to objects and animals talking (or pretend you can), and remember that you can end your writing with a question.

This week over at Sharing Our Notebooks, I welcome author Peter Salomon and congratulate him on his forthcoming book, HENRY FRANKS. Please stop by and read about his first notebooks, and enter yourself in the giveaway of his new book - coming out this week!

If you are interested in entering to win a copy of THE POETRY FRIDAY ANTHOLOGY (in which I am happy to have 5 poems!), please stop by Friday's post and leave a comment there.  Thistle will draw a winning name on Thursday night, and I will announce the winner on Poetry Friday!

This week also marks a change in The Poem Farm schedule - I am now back and posting poems and poem greetings each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back and visit for lessons, poem ideas, book recommendations, and classroom Poetry Peeks.  If you are a classroom teacher or homeschooling parent, I invite you to share your students' poetry or your poem teaching ideas here.  If you are interested, please send me an e-mail to amy at amylv dot com, and I will get right back to you.

Please share a comment below if you wish.

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

Like The Poem Farm on Facebook for more poems, articles, and poemquotes!