Past Poetry Posts
Spring 08 Poetry Posts
Someday I'll Need To Find My Voice
Bold and outgoing at the first four periods
Talkative and jumpy at lunch
Still cheerful at fifth period,
When sixth period hits, I'm not myself,
Some part of me is missing...
My voice.
My voice is held captive by the whole class,
The students or the teachers didn't take it,
I gave it to them.
I am taller than many of them,
However, I am small,
I'm small in personality, small in experience,
Small in knowledge.
I'm like a snail,
Even though I try to move and retrieve my voice,
I seem to get nowhere.
All I see when I look up are the students’ fuchsia sneakers
Or their white Nike socks.
When the bell rings and I leave the land
Where everybody there has my voice,
My voice finds its way back to me.
I know someday I will need to find my voice
In my 6th grade math class.
-Jenny Koh, age 11
Lane County, Oregon
PARTNER POEM for Someday I'll Need To Find My Voice
The Little Mute Boy
The little mute boy was looking for his voice.
(The kind of the crickets had it).
In a drop of water
the little boy was looking for his voice.
I do not want it for speaking with:
I will make a ring of it
so that he may wear my silence
on his little finger.
In a drop of water
the little boy was looking for his voice.
(The captive voice, far away,
put on a cricket's clothes).
-Federico Lorca, translated by W.S. Merwin, Spain
ASK the POEM for Someday I'll Need To Find My Voice & The Little Mute Boy
1. Poem, what kind of journey do you take me on?
2. How do you surprise me?
3. What feelings are you sharing with me?
4. What adventures does your voice go on without you?
5. What noise can you make to call your voice back?
Winter 08 Poetry Posts
The First Sky Is Inside You
(from a poem by Li-Young Lee)
The first sky is inside you,
A shadow on a butterfly's cheek,
A story made of grapes,
A kiss flecked with chocolate,
Laughing the song of a thousand moons,
Dancing the love of a thousand suns,
Outside is the inside,
Inside is out,
Color and light blend
To create miraculous illusions
Where people have skin of blue quartz,
Topaz eyes,
And the ocean is fire.
The first sky is inside you,
Bigger than life,
Smaller than the cost of forgiveness.
The first sky is love,
Kept in a walnut
Or enclosing the universe,
Equal only to the smile
A mother gives
As she watches her child at play.
The first sky
And the last sky blend
Into one.
--Kayla Cassidy, age 12
Lane County, Oregon
Partner Poem
One Heart
Look at the birds. Even flying
is born
out of nothing. The first sky
is inside you, open
at either end of day.
The work of wings
was always freedom, fastening
one heart to every falling thing.
--Li-Young Lee
Chicago, Illinois
Ask the Poems
1. Poem, what do you invite me to wonder about?
2. How are your words like music?
3. How do you give me the feeling of something magical?
4. What else is inside you?
5. What can you let out?
Fall 07 Poetry Posts
Dear Young Owl
Dear young owl, heed my word,
If you're to live, this must be heard.
Fly high, fly low, like black shadow,
The mice will never know.
Mouse, vole, mole in hole,
Shrew and lizard bold,
Beware the owl, we don't howl,
Your head in our beak's hold.
If in barn your family lives,
Beware black rafter swiftly gives.
And if in tree your family dwells,
Watch for raccoon--danger swells.
Swoop down from the moonlit sky,
The mice will never know how they die.
Crush the head, break the neck,
To me that mouse is just a speck.
Someday soon you'll leave the nest,
And put your skills to the test.
So spread your wings and find a home,
'Cause soon, young owl, you're on your own.
--Rachael Edwards, age 11
PARTNER POEM
White Owl Flies Into and Out of the Field
Coming down
out of the freezing sky
with its depths of light,
like an angel,
or a buddha with wings,
it was beautiful
and accurate,
striking the snow and whatever was there
with a force that left the imprint
of the tips of its wings--
five feet apart--and the grabbing
thrust of its feet,
and the indentation of what had been running
through the white valleys
of the snow--
and then it rose, gracefully,
and flew back to the frozen marshes,
to lurk there,
like a little lighthouse,
in the blue shadows--
so I thought:
maybe death
isn't darkness, after all,
but so much light
wrapping itself around us--
as soft as feathers--
that we are instantly weary
of looking and looking and shut our eyes,
not without amazement
and let ourselv
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