Poetry Friday - Poetry Pals Gather Us

   

       It's Poetry Friday, and Tanita S. Davis is hosting HERE at {fiction! instead of Lies}! It's time for a Poetry Sisters challenge, 

       Here's is the challenge I copied last month from Laura Purdie Salas: 

            If you’d like to write with us in November, here’s our mission: Pluck a line or a theme from Jane Hirshfield’s “Two Versions,” and let that inspire your poem. I don’t find an online version easily available, so I’ll give you the first two lines:

“In the first version I slept by a stream.
All night awake things traveled near.”

Be sure to share your poem on Friday, November 29th, and use #poetrypals if you share it on social.

Stream at Longcarne Farm -
geograph.org.uk - 3958015.jpg

      I wrote about my husband last time, too. November and December bring more memories of him. This year's end bring his birthday, other family celebrations, and the holidays, so full of the traditions and special times we created together. Here is the poem, dear Poetry sisters, from the prompt you gave us.

More of November

 

“In the first version, I slept by a stream.

I dreamed.
And there you were, cuddled close,

Warming me, keeping us safe 

From the world’s dangers.

Then, the second version took over.

My back chilled.

You were swept away, they said

Into a journey all alone, no goodbyes

That time, but this I know: 

Someday, I’ll find the right stream,

and we’ll lie down together, 

Like that first version!

            Linda Baie ©

Monday Reading Recap - Love these Books!

          

    Visit Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders and Jen at Teach Mentor Texts to see what they and others have been reading! Your TBR lists will grow!

     For those of you celebrating, I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving! We have some snow coming to Denver, but a lot in the mountains, moving in from that big California storm! If you're traveling, hope all goes well for you! 

              Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin's collaboration for this new book about the time in Bletchley Park gives a new personal perspective of this quite secret place formed to combat Hitler's march to capture Europe! I write "personal" because they have introduced imagined characters, a brother, Jakob, and sister, Lizzie, and new friends who happen to already live in that area or who work there. There's also a host of essential characters in charge whom we have known from history, like Alan Turing and Dilly Knox. Jakob, a whiz at math, is already working in secret to break the codes. Lizzie, 14, is on her way to escape to America, ordered there by a wealthy grandmother. She manages a swift escape in order to stay, much to the outrage of her grandmother. 

            This family has an American mother, Willa, working at the American embassy, who's last known to be in Poland, but many believe she's been killed. Others suspect she has betrayed the British and become the enemy. Lizzie keeps faithfully denying, ever pursuing the truth. In alternating chapters, the events of Jakob's and Lizzie's lives are told as month by month, the Germans get closer, and stories of some unravel, both sad and wonderful to discover. Occasionally, there are photos included of the Enigma machines, newspaper headlines, war pictures. It's a book of a time kept secret, some finally allowed to share decades later, and some who never told. Let Sepetys and Sheinkin take you time-traveling eighty-five years to Great Britain preparing for war. You'll be fascinated by their story! 

        For everyone who has adored the intriguing humor of the books by Edward Gorey, here is a picture book highlighting this man who entertained readers and playgoers throughout his life. Matthew Burgess shares, at the book's beginning (of Gorey's early years), when toddler Gorey saw a train and created his first art, "a sausage train," which his mother kept. Readers learn of Gorey teaching himself to read at three and a half, eventually reading Dracula before he was six! Later in life, he designed the sets for the Broadway play Dracula! He led a singular life, eventually retiring to an old home on Cape Cod. It's a fascinating book about him, brought to us in dynamic, intriguing illustrations by Marc Majewski! 

    When I looked, this evidently was created from a Webcomic, and its spooky tale from Blackwater, Maine, full of high school teen troubles, kept me wondering, "Oh no! What horrors could be next?" Two boys keep it all going, along with a goth girl, a ghost fisherman, and creepy changes page by page shown so wonderfully. I wasn't sure if they were real or a sad reflection of teenage emotions crying out for a lot of help. It's an all-inclusive tale that feels very real, pulls at one's heart for these young ones who need a lot of understanding and help. 

          With the dryest of humor and the most intriguing and inventive illustrations, Alex London and Paul O. Zelensky have created a book for quiet viewing while smiling a lot and then laughing out loud! Most of us readers know what a still life is, however, discovering also what it is not, what it does not do, lies in the hilarity of their new book. Remember, when a candle is placed into a still life, "The candle does not flicker, glow, or drip." There is more, and I would love to read this aloud! Be sure to find this book!

Currently Reading:  I did finish Anne Nesbet's The Long Way Around and it is very good, but no time to write a review! I'm not sure what's next. 

Monday Reading - New and Old!

         

    Visit Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders and Jen at Teach Mentor Texts to see what they and others have been reading! Your TBR lists will grow!

Thanks to Candlewick Press
for my copy!

         A return to Norendy, where the Puppets of Spelhorst lived, and a new setting at the Hotel Bazaar where young Marta lives with her mother who works as a maid there. Each morning when her mother goes to work, Marta is left to her own days, counting up and down the stairs, watching a cat chasing a mouse (on a clock) and wondering about a painting with one wing in the ocean. However, all is not at all lost when a mysterious countess arrives, with a parrot. With magical stories and the loveliest of light, the tales move, from one to seven, helping Marta begin to have hope that her longlost father could, at last, be returning. Line art by Júlia Sardà enhances the imagination as each story is told; readers will want so much to hurry, to find out "What's Next!" I can imagine reading this, part by part, every day to a young class. It will become a favorite read aloud!

           I so enjoyed this book by Jilanne Hoffmann, the beauty of its presentation, the scientific information given in the picture book story, and more extensively explained in the back matter. The flap summarizes that the dust of the Sahel–a ribbon of land between the Sahara and the savanna– lifts with the harmattan wind each winter season. The dust from both mixes and travels thousands of miles westward, across the African continent and the Atlantic Ocean, to reunite with its unforgotten home deep in the Amazon basin. This is all new to me, and the story illustrated so beautifully by Eugenia Mello carried me along just like the dust is carried, landing at home! Told by the dust itself, readers will be mesmerized by the journey and, fortunately, will get to know more from the back matter, including NASA's observations, continental history, and an Author's Note. There, Hoffman relates that at publication, new research changes some of the earlier findings. It's terrific!

        It's a simple but arresting counting book by Tanya Tagaq, a Canadian Inuk, imagining a grand parade of polar bears, shown in both English and Inuktitut. The first is joined by another, and as they gather, they're sniffing, hunting, playing, dancing, and more. It will be much fun to read aloud, both enjoying the text and the art by Lee Pootoogook, a carver and printmaker. The ending offers a wonderful laugh.

      Buffy Silverman's books are a must when studying nature, along with using them as inspiration for writing. After a trip outdoors, readers can write prose or poetry and perhaps this book, or others from Buffy, can inspire some nature sketching, too!  This time, she offers poems to accompany some observed thrilling evening sounds while connecting the songs to musical instruments! For example, the second verse of one poem ends with "Oo-week, oo-week! Wood duck calls,/She flaps away/as darkness calls." The call is connected to an oboe. 

        The photos, credit given to numerous people, are marvelous to see, and may offer their own inspiration after reading and viewing! 

      There are two sections in the back matter filled with great information: "Meet the Musicians" and "Meet the Instruments".  Don't miss this book when studying the out-of-doors or just enjoying a taste of Buffy's "Starlight Symphony"!

        This is a re-read, but I wanted to share again to offer a new look at how all of us can help Stillwater and Koo "Save The World." My review on Goodreads is here! 

         Mo Yan is the first citizen of China to win the Novel Prize in Literature, which he won in 2012 for Red Sorghum. This picture book comes from his novella of the same name, a poignant story of the time this seven-year-old boy rises early to go with his grandfather, Yeye, to gather grass for drying and animal feed. It's quite a journey, showing such courage and resilience, eventually in a massive windstorm, the "GALE".  As you see from the cover, Zhu Chengliang's illustrations bring the story to life so that readers feel they are also right there with this pair. An excerpt from the novella at the end adds a bit more of their life story. It's a special book! 

Now reading: Sepetys' and Sheinken's The Bletchley Riddle! 

Poetry Friday - In the Night

  

       It's Poetry Friday, and Karen Edmisten is hosting HERE at The Blog With The Shockingly Clever Title! You'll need to visit so you can see just what she's named it! Thanks for hosting, Karen! 

       We all have those special dates that we remember when they come. It's most often a loved one's birthday, and often they have passed on, but I also note the birthdays of extended family, ones I don't see very much anymore.  

         This coming Wednesday, November 20th, is my husband's birthday. He hasn't been with us for eleven years, but I'm sure you know that I will always remember and keep him close especially on his day! This week, Poem a Day shared a poem that touched me deeply. It is new to me and I want to share it, for all of you, and for Arvie, "my love", a Happy Birthday! 

At the head of the table, probably a holiday
long ago! 

At The Mid Hour of Night 

        by Thomas Moore

1779 – 1852

 

At the mid hour of night, when stars are weeping, I fly 
To the lone vale we loved, when life shone warm in thine eye;
And I think oft, if spirits can steal from the regions of air, 
To revisit past scenes of delight, thou wilt come to me there,
And tell me our love is remembered, even in the sky. 

Then I sing the wild song ’twas once such pleasure to hear! 
When our voices commingling breathed, like one, on the ear;
And, as Echo far off through the vale my sad orison rolls, 
I think, oh my love! ’tis thy voice from the Kingdom of Souls,
Faintly answering still the notes that once were so dear.

This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on November 9, 2024, by the Academy of American Poets.

 You can access the entry here which includes the audio, too.

It's Monday - New Books & Old

 

         

    Visit Kellee and Ricki at UnleashingReaders and Jen at Teach Mentor Texts to see what they and others have been reading! Your TBR lists will grow!

    I have quite a lot to share but the snowstorm in Denver, south and north and east, kept me busy. We had about a foot, and it'll be around fifty degrees all week, the melting time! It was very wet and heavy, did a lot of damage to trees, thus some lost electricity. My area was fine. Our lines are underground!

        I finally found time to finish the new Richard Osman mystery, We Solve Murders. What a delightful group of the good and the bad, a complicated plot that takes readers all over the world. The many-layered characters, even the ones Osman indicates we'll meet again, are not always perfect, yet bring new ways to look at lives being lived, whether honest or dishonest. If you've enjoyed the Thursday Murder Club books, you'll enjoy this fresh group who do "solve murders"! In the acknowledgment, there is a promise for a return to the older group, too, AND more from this new one! 

        I am laughing at myself because I grabbed this book from my library's shelf, loving Blue-Footed Boobies, and wanted to see what Nancy Vo had to say! No, I didn't know until I read it that it isn't about them at all but about mammary glands and other related things. It's an enticing picture book for younger readers that will entertain, educate, and delight. Nancy Vo keeps the information clear and the child-friendly illustrations close to reality. She starts with the fun fact that Blue-Footed Boobies don't have boobies at all. They're avian, not mammalian, thus begins the explanations of where and why, and how many, all about "boobies" or none. Children wondering about their bodies and changes that will happen with growing older will have an excellent first look at them, in addition to learning about various other animals and plants, with or without boobies! I enjoyed it, but I will have to discover another book about those Blue-Footed Boobies I love!

          Cary Fagan, the author, grew up in Belgium, but his journey of escape during the Nazi invasion kept him out of school, fleeing with his family to Paris, through Spain to Portugal, then, fortunately, across the ocean to a refugee camp in Jamaica. He's created HIS story by telling of a boy named Maurice who has a goal to become a lawyer, but he is not getting to be in school and is very worried about his learning. He finds a professor to teach him and eventually becomes a fine student who is accepted to a college in Canada. His English dictionary that you see him holding on the cover illustration becomes a tool for his life.

         It's a powerful graphic novel illustrated by Enzo Lord Mariano, who uses lights and darks with subtle changes of emotion and scenery to show times spent both happily and in danger. Maurice is courageous and does not quit learning and pushing for better. 

          There is a poignant author's note at the back about Cary Fagan's family, with pictures of them and that fabulous, special dictionary! 

        

Poetry Friday - How It Works

 

       It's Poetry Friday, and Cathy Mere is hosting HERE on her blog Merely Day by Day! In the poem she shares, we learn some good steps for what is certainly next for us all. I am inspired and grateful to start this special Poetry Friday after Tuesday's election with all of you. Thanks for hosting, Cathy!

       Since Tuesday, and during the days before the election, I watched Vice-President Kamala Harris become a woman whose actions I appreciated so much for my grandchildren, a grandson and two granddaughters, to see. She showed resilience, strength, and oh, so much intelligence in her explanations. She had great responses, and especially when questions felt charged with the goal of catching her out, perhaps in a contradiction from previous words. It looked tough, but she was tougher!   

       I enjoyed learning about Kamala Harris's childhood, and seeing the photos of her as she grew up. And, I began to imagine when babies and toddlers in early childhood begin to have agency. If you've experienced that, you might recognize what I wrote and perhaps have your own examples! After this poem's stance, I have hope that every young one will carry on!

My two granddaughters, journaling on a zoo trip quite a few
years ago.

              How It Works

 

I learn by one to watch Mama’s eyes

to see if I’ve cried enough to solve the problem

of thirst.

My puzzle at two is to assess the room 

to discover a strategy for escaping from the crib.

The problem at three is to wait until both parents are asleep

and won’t reverse my decision to crawl in bed with them.

My flexible brain at four uses my memory of problem-solving

in order to use my abilities to fetch anything I want,

like the cookies high in the cupboard.

At five, anything can happen.

 

Linda Baie ©