Category: Poetry

A Fairer House Than Prose: Emily Dickinson and The Little White House Project

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This is way cooler than my high school English projects. Deerfield Academy student Peter Krasznekewic has constructed 34 small houses, all made from sustainable materials and all bearing a line from an Emily Dickinson poem. His “Little White House Project” is featured on the grounds of the Emily Dickinson Museum in Amherst.

Jane Wald, executive director of the Dickinson museum, says:

“When Peter first came to me, it was clear he was thinking about the wider Pioneer Valley. Part of the concept was integrating it with the bigger landscape…The museum has been working to figure out how to connect Emily’s poetry to other art forms and artists, and maybe find an edgy way to do that.”

So excited to hear that teens like Peter and looking for ways to both appreciate art and create their own, while also connecting to their communities. The exhibit will be up until June 30; it’s free and open to the public. Good excuse to make the trip out to Amherst!

Read the rest of the article for more info on Peter and his project.

(H/T: NCBLA)(image: Emily Dickinson Museum)

Hear the Monster’s Call

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When I did study abroad in England, I discovered Poems on the Underground, a project created to share poetry with Londoners on the Tube. One poem I came across was The Loch Ness Monster’s Song by Edwin Morgan. You can read and hear it here. Most poetry is meant to be heard, but The Loch Ness Monster’s Song practically demands it.

I think it would be a great poem to use in the classroom, since it shows how poetry doesn’t need to be stuffy and use impressive language. In fact, it doesn’t even need to use real language at all.

Also, it’s just the kind of poem I need on this gray, damp day.

(H/T bookshelves of doom)(image: Wikipedia)

Owl Development

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Another poem for National Poetry Month. I couldn’t resist one with owls:

How To Build an Owl
By Kathleen Lynch

1. Decide you must.

2. Develop deep respect
for feather, bone, claw.

3. Place your trembling thumb
where the heart will be:
for one hundred hours watch
so you will know
where to put the first feather.

4. Stay awake forever.
When the bird takes shape
gently pry open its beak
and whisper into it: mouse.

5. Let it go.

(via swissmiss)

Star Light, Star Bright

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Can you believe we’re almost at the end of National Poetry Month? Which means it’s time to share another poem. This one is by Tracy K. Smith, who recently won the Pulitzer Prize for her collection of poetry, Life on Mars. The poem “My God, It’s Full of Stars,” is from that collection. The poem is pretty long, so I’ll just quote a cool section here:

MY GOD, IT’S FULL OF STARS

1.

We like to think of it as parallel to what we know,
Only bigger. One man against the authorities.
Or one man against a city of zombies. One man

Who is not, in fact, a man, sent to understand
The caravan of men now chasing him like red ants
Let loose down the pants of America. Man on the run.

Man with a ship to catch, a payload to drop,
This message going out to all of space…. Though
Maybe it’s more like life below the sea: silent,

Buoyant, bizarrely benign. Relics
Of an outmoded design. Some like to imagine
A cosmic mother watching through a spray of stars,

Mouthing yes, yes as we toddle toward the light,
Biting her lip if we teeter at some ledge. Longing
To sweep us to her breast, she hopes for the best

While the father storms through adjacent rooms
Ranting with the force of Kingdom Come,
Not caring anymore what might snap us in its jaw.

Sometimes, what I see is a library in a rural community.
All the tall shelves in the big open room. And the pencils
In a cup at Circulation, gnawed on by the entire population.

The books have lived here all along, belonging
For weeks at a time to one or another in the brief sequence
Of family names, speaking (at night mostly) to a face,

A pair of eyes. The most remarkable lies.

Read on at the Awl. Frankly, I think it’s awesome to write a poem that includes zombies, Kubrick, and the infinity of the universe.

You can also here Smith talk about her poem and read a part of it here.

(image by NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, via the Smithsonian Institution)

Please Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood

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The next time someone tells you that the road less traveled by makes all the difference, you can tell them that Robert Frost didn’t really care what path you took:

“Frost is actually using an old technique known as the “unreliable narrator,” and he isn’t even being all that subtle about it: in spite of the famous quote’s insistence that one road is “less traveled by,” the second stanza of the poem clarifies that both roads are “worn… really about the same.”  Oh, and also, Frost himself admitted that he was actually mocking the idea that single decisions would change your life, and specifically making fun of a friend of his who had a tendency to over-think things that really weren’t that big a deal.”

Click through for more misunderstood lines in famous poems/plays/books. And heckle the next graduation speaker to use them incorrectly.

More Loving

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I stumbled across this poem by W.H Auden the other day and thought it would be a good one to share for National Poetry Month:

The More Loving One
by W. H. Auden

Looking up at the stars, I know quite well
That, for all they care, I can go to hell,
But on earth indifference is the least
We have to dread from man or beast.

How should we like it were stars to burn
With a passion for us we could not return?
If equal affection cannot be,
Let the more loving one be me.

Admirer as I think I am
Of stars that do not give a damn,
I cannot, now I see them, say
I missed one terribly all day.

Were all stars to disappear or die,
I should learn to look at an empty sky
And feel its total dark sublime,
Though this might take me a little time.

Inspiration for a YA novel, anyone? I feel like sections of this poem could be fantastic as a title or epigraph.

Poem to Go

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One of the most fun National Poetry Month projects I’ve seen is Poem in Your Pocket Day. In Charlottesville, VA (one of my very favorite places in the world), Poem in Your Pocket Day has been lead by the fantastic librarians at the Jefferson-Madison Regional Library. Take a look at how they shared thousands of poems with Charlottesville residents in 2010:

So glad to hear about the response, including the enthusiasm of volunteers. Well done, Cville poem-lovers!

This year’s Poem in Your Pocket Day will be on Thursday, April 26. Any plans to share a poem?

Write Your Own STEM Haiku

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What happens when you combine the sciences and the arts? STEM haiku at STEM Friday! The idea, in celebration of National Poetry Month:

  1. Select a STEM (science, technology, engineering or math) topic.
  2. Brainstorm a list of words about your topic.
  3. Count the syllables in each word.
  4. Use the words to share a short STEM thought using the haiku format.

What a cool way to combine poetry and science. My example:

A siren wails.
It approaches, wavelength shifts–
Wave farewell, Doppler.

Try out your own science haiku and share below or in the comments at STEM Friday.