Day 28 - National Poetry Month 2015 - Sing That Poem!

Happy National Poetry Month!

Welcome to Day 28 of this Year's Poem Farm Project!

Find the Complete April 2015 Poem and Song List Here

First, I would like to welcome all old and new friends to The Poem Farm this April. Spring is a busy time on all farms, and this one is no exception.  Each April, many poets and bloggers take on special poetry projects, and I'm doing so too.  You can learn all about Sing That Poem! and how to play on my April 1st post, where you will also find the list of the whole month's poems and tunes as I write and share them.  If you'd like to print out a matching game page for yourself, you can find one here, and during April 2015, you'll be able to see the song list right over there in the left hand sidebar.

Yesterday's poem was Alone Outside.  Here is the tune that goes along with it, below. Did you figure it out?

Margaret Simon's students from Caneview Elementary in New Iberia, Louisiana, have done it again!  You can hear them singing below.

And here is the music to go with yesterday's poem, The Tree Song, written by Margaret's students, Matthew, Tyler, Noah, Jacob, and Vanissa, from Jefferson Island Road Elementary in New Iberia, Louisiana.  As you will hear, this song is to the same tune as "Alone Outside."

And here, below, is today's poem.  Look at the song list in the sidebar or on your matching form to see if you can puzzle out which tune matches this one.

Poems Finding Pockets!

by Amy LV

Students - Poem in Your Pocket Day is on Thursday!  On this special day, people across the United States carry poems in their pockets and share them with friends and strangers.  I wrote today's poemsong in anticipation of this soon-day.

Students often ask me, "Amy, why do you write so many poems?"  One reason is because there is a poem for everything.  A poem CAN be happy or sad.  It CAN tell a story or help me remember something from long ago or slow down my mind or help me feel grateful or stand in awe.  It will be hard to know which poem to place in my pocket this week...perhaps I will choose two!

Teachers - Here, at ReadWriteThink, are a few resources if you would like to invite your students to carry poems in their pockets.

Anyone who wishes to share any poem-pocket-joy with me, I'd love to post your pictures and ideas here, perhaps on a brand new Poem in Your Pocket Page!

And if you have not yet seen this new book by Margaret Mcnamara and illustrated by G. Brian Karas, I imagine you will enjoy Elinor's journey to find a just-right poem for her pocket.

Available through IndieBound

And now for another Poetry Month tradition... For the past few years, poet and novelist Irene Latham has invited all interested bloggers to participate in a Progressive Poem.  This poem moves from blog to blog throughout April of each year, and each day, the blogger-of-the-day adds a new line to the growing poem. You can see the travels of this year's poem here at Irene's blog, Live Your Poem - just look in the sidebar during this month of April 2015.

If you'd like to read the Progressive Poems from 2012, 2013, and 2014, you can read them, also at Irene's blog - here.

Yesterday it was my turn to happily receive the poem from Jan at Bookseedstudio, and today I hand it off to Donna at Mainely Write.  You will see the line I added in blue...at the very end.  My apologies for any extra line breaks; these were caused by the width of my blog.  Take it away, Donna!

TO BE TITLED,
2015 Poetry Friday Progressive Poem by an assembly collected by poet Irene Latham

She lives without a net, walking along the alluvium of the delta.
Shoes swing over her shoulder, on her bare feet stick jeweled flecks of dark mica.

Hands faster than fish swing at the ends of bare brown arms.
Her hair flows, snows in wild wind as she digs in the indigo varnished handbag,

pulls out her grandmother’s oval cuffed bracelet,
 strokes the turquoise stones,
and steps through the curved doorway.

Tripping on her tail she slips hair first down the slide…splash!
She glides past glossy water hyacinth to shimmer with a school of shad,
listens to the ibises roosting in the trees of the cypress swamp

an echo of Grandmother’s words, still fresh in her windswept memory;
“Born from the oyster, expect the pearl. Reach for the rainbow reflection on the smallest dewdrop.”

The surface glistens, a shadow slips above her head, a paddle dips
she reaches, seizes. She’s electric energy and turquoise eyes.

Lifted high, she gulps strange air – stares clearly into
 Green pirogue, crawfish trap,
startled fisherman with turquoise eyes, twins of her own, riveted on her wrist–

She’s swifter than a dolphin, slipping away,
leaving him only a handful of memories of his own grandmother’s counsel:

“Watch for her. You’ll have but one chance to 
determine—to decide.
Garner wisdom from the water and from the pearl of the past.”

In a quicksilver flash, an arc of resolution, he leaps
into the shimmering water
where hidden sentries restrain any pursuit
and the bitter taste of impulse rushes into his lungs.

Her flipper flutters his weathered toes – Pearl’s signal –
Stop struggling. The Sentinels will escort you

He stills, closes his eyes,
takes an uncharacteristic breath of…water!

Released, he swims, chasing the glimmer of the bracelet
Gran gave the daughter who reveled in waves.

Straining for fading incandescence, flecks of silver, his eyes and hands clasp cold silt,
flakes of sharp shale seething through fingers – crimson palms stinging.

A sea change ripples his shuddering back.
With a force summoned from the depths, her charged turquoise eyes unsuffer his heart

And holding out her hand to him, she knows. He knows. She speaks --

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