Intro to Poetry

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Intro to Poetry

• Why Write it?
• What does it do?

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Whats inside a poem?

• Poetry includes certain things that make it
  different from prose.
• Prose is any writing that is not poetry.

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Images

• When a poet tries to capture in words how
  something looks, tastes, smells, feels, or
  sounds, those descriptions are called images.

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Images

• The hare limped trembling through the frozen
  grass.
• John Keats

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Imagery Expert

• Meet Sandra Cisneros
• Most famous for her book House on Mango Street
  and her Latin American themes.

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Imagery Expert

• Meet John Updike
• Most famous for a series of books about a
  character, Rabbit.
• Two of them won the Pulitzer Prize, which honors
  great American fiction, usually about the
  American life.

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Now, Find the Images

• Good Hot Dogs for Kiki by Sandra Cisneros
• September by John Updike

• What did you find?
• Dash those hot dogs into buns and splash on all
  the good stuff
• What did you find?
• The days are polished with a morning haze

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Word Music

• Good poets pick their words very carefully. They
  are concerned as much about what the word means
  as how it sounds. Some word music imitates
  sounds, and some word music repeats them.

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Word Music

• buccaneers of buzz
• (referring to bees)
• Emily Dickinson
• the silken, sad, uncertain rustling in our
  ears.
• Edgar Allan Poe

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Word Music Expert

• Meet Patricia Hubbell
• East Coast poet.
• Has written many poems for kids.

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Word Music Expert

• Meet Walt Mason
• Known as Uncle Walt.
• Known as a poet philosopher

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Now, Find the Word Music

• Flittermice by Patricia Hubbell
• Football by Walt Mason

• What did you find?
• What did you find?

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Beats that Repeat

• Poems have rhythms you can see, hear, and feel
  ... like a kid swinging on a swing. Beats in
  poetry are made up of silences and whams. We
  call a wham a stress.

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Beats that Repeat

• We Real Cool
• THE POOL LAYERS.
• SEVEN AT THE GOLDEN SHOVEL
• We real cool. We
• Left school. We
• Lurk late. We
• Strike straight. We
• Sing sin. We
• Thin gin. We
• Jazz June. We
• Die soon.
• Gwendolyn Brooks

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Beats that Repeat Expert

• Meet Robert Louis Stevenson
• Most famous for Treasure Island and The Strange
  Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
• Literary celebrity during his lifetime.

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Beats that Repeat Expert

• Meet Charles R. Smith, Jr.
• Went to elementary school in Compton, CA. and now
  lives in upstate New York.
• Loves his job combining photography, poetry, and
  sports.

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Now, Find the Beats that Repeat

• Windy Nights by Robert Louis Stevenson
• Allow Me to Introduce Myself by Charles Smith,
  Jr.

• What did you find?
• What did you find?

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Likenesses

• Poets train themselves to see things in ways
  others dont. They are always putting things
  together in unexpected ways.

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Likenesses

• Thunder threatens
• Like a sound that rolls around and around
• In a mean dogs throat
• --Martha Sherwood

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Likenesses Expert

• Meet Langston Hughes
• Most famous for his innovation of jazz poetry.
• Active member of Harlem Renaissance.

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Likenesses Expert

• Meet Christina Rossetti.
• English poet most famous for her long poem,
  Goblin Market.

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Now, Find the Likenesses

• Dreams by Langston Hughes
• The Horses of the Sea by Christina Rossetti.

• What did you find?
• What did you find?

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Word Play

• Poets are word lovers. They love rhymes, and
  chimes, and echoes. They also tend to invent
  new words, combine words in strange ways, and use
  puns and jokes. They play with words.

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Word Play

• Sing me a song
• of teapots and trumpets
• Trumpots and teapets
• And tippets and taps,
• Trippers and trappers
• and jelly bean wrappers
• and pigs in pajamas
• with zippers and snaps
• --N.M. Bodecker

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Word Play Expert

• Meet E.E. Cummings.
• Wanted to be a poet as a kid and wrote poetry
  daily, from eight to 22!
• Was once a prisoner of war!

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Word Play Expert

• Meet Jack Prelutsky.
• Grew up a poor kid in the Bronx, NY.
• Has written more than 50 poetry collections.

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Why write poetry?

• 1. To make someone smile Some poems are just
  for fun!

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To Make Someone Smile

• Commas
• Do commas have mommas
• Who teach them to pause,
• Who comfort and calm them,
• And clean their sharp claws?
• Who tell them short stories
• Of uncommon commas
• And send them to bed
• In their comma pajamas?
• --Douglas Florian

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To Make Someone Smile

• Find One
• p
• A Time to Talk, Robert Frost
• 37 Oranges, Gary Soto
• 77 If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking,
  Dickinson
• 109 Legacy II, Leroy V. Quintana
• 108 The Courage That My Mother Had, Edna St.
  Vincent Millay
• 112 The Secret Heart, Robert P. Tristram Coffin
• 180 The Listeners, Walter de la Mare

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Why write poetry?

• 2. To tell a story The very first stories
  werent told in books, they were sung or spoken
  in verse . . . from memory. Some, called
  ballads, are long while other recent story poems
  are short.

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To Tell a Story

• The Purist
• I give you now Professor Twist,
• A conscientious scientist.
• Trustees exclaimed, He never bungles!
• And sent him off to distant jungles.
• Camped on a tropic riverside,
• One day he missed his loving bride.
• She had, the guide informed him later,
• Been eaten by an alligator.
• Professor Twist could not but smile.
• You mean, he said, a crocodile.
• --Ogden Nash

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Why write poetry?

• 3. To send a message Poems often have a point
  they leave us with something to think about.

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To Send a Message

• The Golf Links
• The golf links lie so near the mill
• That almost every day
• The laboring children can look out
• And see the men at play.
• -- Sarah N. Cleghorn

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Why write poetry?

• 4. To share feelings Poets feel strongly and
  want the reader to experience that feeling
  moment with them. Poets express happiness,
  sadness, anger, fear, loneliness, etc.

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To Share Feelings

• 4. To share feelings Poets feel strongly and
  want the reader to experience that feeling
  moment with them. Poets express happiness,
  sadness, anger, fear, loneliness, etc.

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Why write poetry?

• 5. To help you understand people What makes
  Jimmy avoid other kids? How does it feel to be
  homeless? Poems can give us insight into why
  people make the choices they do.

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Why write poetry?

• 6. To make people wonder People love magic and
  mystery ghosts, dragons, creatures. Sometimes,
  they weave a more ordinary magic finding the
  wonder in an ordinary magnet, for example.

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Reference

• You must determine your own opinions about what
  constitutes the best poetry.
• This presentation was developed with the ideas
  from Knock at a Star A Childs Introduction to
  Poetry by X.J. Kennedy and Dorothy M. Kennedy.