Poetry Friday - Learning About Others

  
   At Bookseed Studio, Jan Godown Annino welcomes everyone to Poetry Friday. She's sharing a celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King, whose birthday will be celebrated this coming Monday.  Thanks for hosting, Jan! 

         There have been a few times recently when I am sad to be no longer teaching, no longer able to share beautiful writing with my students. This is one time when I will have to settle for sharing with former colleagues, telling them that they must get this book in order to talk about feelings of friendship and race. Many of my students, pre and early teens, wrote about self, and those who stare. Here is part of one poem:

         Your face holds no expression.

          You stare out, blank eyes.

          If only we knew when

          your throbbing heart

          bleeds, dances, or breaks.

          You allow us to see nothing.

          I wish it was different.

Irene and Charles tell a story with poetry in their new book, Can I Touch Your Hair? Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship, of a boy’s and a girl’s inner feelings, about self, feelings about each other, universal kid concerns and deeper racial questions. Through sharing parts of those feelings, about what might be termed “safe” subjects, these two kids learn about each other, learn that they have a few common likes and dislikes. Maybe they can even be friends?  It is a good path but doesn’t start well. Irene and Charles (the authors use their own names as they tell the story) are forced to work together on a Poem Project: As partners are chosen, Irene thinks: “you-never-know-what/he’s-going-to-say Charles/is the only one left.”  And Charles: “She hardly says anything. Plus, she’s white.”

I read the book to my granddaughters this week. They are Ingrid, eight and Imogene, six. Imogene is perhaps too young for all the poems but when we came to the poems about hair, her response was that everyone should know not to touch anyone without permission, and Ingrid, with hair like Irene, “long and straight--/a curtain I can hide/behind “ laughed and said, “that’s true, I can.”  Charles’ words showed how angry he felt when someone patted his head, said “It feels like a sponge.”  Then, Charles patted that person’s head, said back, “Your hair feels like a mop.” The girls laughed, said, "That’s good, he took up for himself. He didn't stay quiet.” Some might say this book is only for older kids, wa-ay older, yet the girls took what connected to them at this time, and will understand and think about more as they re-read it. 

I don’t want to dwell on two young girls’ responses but will say they enjoyed the book and commented on most of one theme of the story, that people, kids just like in their classrooms, are different, and it’s good to get to know them because they might become good friends. Friendship is important to kids as they navigate growing up, and the more experiences they have with people, the more they will feel good about who they are, and that it’s okay for them to have different looks, different favorites, experiences, and families.

I smiled when I read the poems about shoes. That topic is one that students love. This time, Charles and Irene discover some common ground; both have wishes for shoes that aren’t granted. Irene tells: “Mama says/shoes should be/sensible--“  Charles also shows disappointment: “Dad hands me a pair of low tops,/no cool design, no bright color or dynamite laces.” As these two partners travel through their lives, we read of things that are the same and things different, yet the feelings are deep-down the same. No matter who they are, the feelings about race emerge, and that will spark good talk, for older kids, maybe research. Charles gets picked first in basketball, but when he sails the ball over the backboard, he gets picked last after that. Irene burst out at Charles that “sometimes I just need/a break from people.” but goes on to talk about the sweetness of her horseback riding.

We readers, like Charles and Irene, are getting to know these kids’ deeper feelings in a wonderfully poetic way. There are things they think, hope, dream, and question. The poems deepen in topic, bringing up mistakes and apologies, hard things like the N bomb and thoughts about police, the good and the bad. It’s a story in verse, brief poems of how things are with two kids. They come together at the end, lining up to meet the author Nikki Grimes, both fans, celebrating the good fortune to meet their favorite writer.

The poems face each other on the pages and Sean Qualls and Selina Alko create the pages with pictures of Irene and Charles, showing emotions on their faces as well as important parts of the topic. The collages are mixed up in varying colors and feel just right for each double page. Joyful hearts and shadows, loneliness and satisfaction lie in the words and the pictures.

Thanks to Charles Waters and Irene Latham for a book of hope to learn to become less divided, now especially as we will hear words of Dr. Martin Luther King this coming Monday. I just finished Citizen by Claudia Rankine for my book group. Perhaps Irene and Charles' book is a book of learning for children, as Rankine's book is for adults?