Hidden Wonder
Photo by ? LV
Last week, hurrying out the door on his way to school, Henry cupped a chubby nest in his hands. Henry's third grade class is studying home-building, and he wanted to share this nest from our yard to show how birds build their homes. Crafted from sticks and stuffed with wool, Henry's nest is a perfect example of how animals work with their surroundings. Our Icelandic sheep lose tufts of wool as they scratch on trees, and these fluff balls find their way into nests all around our house.
It is not spring now, not nest-building season at all. In fact, these days I watch flocks of birds rush away, sensing the snow predicted for this week's end. Birds are on their way out of our parts, but souvenirs from last spring remain - nests blown from trees or silhouetted against dark November skies. As writers, we can capture any season at any time, whenever we are touched by a dried seed pod or a memory of snow. Seasons blow and change within our hearts just as they chance outside of our windows.
Students - today's poem began as a long list poem, a straight row of one-word-per-line, one-word-after-another. It was a skinny poem indeed, and after I looked at it, I asked myself, "Hmmm...could I make this poem in the shape of a nest?" With my computer as a friend, I fiddled around with words until this shape emerged. It's exciting to discover when a concrete poem hides inside a rectangular poem.
Happy Thanksgiving to you, my dear friends...the ones I know...and the ones I don't!
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I love how your Nest poem started as a list and morphed into a concrete poem. I plan to share your poem with my second grade students to show them how poems can hide inside of another. I love your website!
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