My poetic attempts and thoughts

My poems

Birdsong

Hooting triple coo
Reminded of summer, long days reveling
In warmth, rivers, friends.
Lying back sharing cheap wine, listening
Three notes warbled, a gargling screech
Trembling, chirping, rising
A rusty door. One repeated note
Of nostalgia and yearning

Ode to books

Within your covers are pages full of places
I’m easily transported, my head suddenly filled
With people, loves, despairs and faces

You captivate me and hold me stilled
My body curled up, my thoughts race
My imagination ready, like fertile earth, well-tilled

With you I’m free, I’m running, I’m full of grace
You make me happy as a coot
I carry you with me everywhere, just in case

You are a small parcel of safety, an escape route
You lead the way through ideas old and new
It is to you I turn for solace when things get blue

My trusty friend, always true
I would be lost without you

Promiscuous Lips

Smiles are kisses without contact
A brief peck from across a crowded room
A mere pursing of lips
A friendly greeting that doesn’t intrude
Or a full-on snog of a grin,
Eye-crinkling, traffic-stopping and promising more
Free and contagious
A passing affair

A small moment

A pot of tea for one
Earl grey, Ceylon or Darjeeling
A small jug of milk
And maybe a cinnamon bun

A few minutes to talk
My anxieties calmed
Soothed by tea
Now let’s continue our walk

Zimbabwe

The United Nations has halved food rations
Millions of Zimbabweans starving
Dependent on aid
Which falls well short of demand

The World Food Programme has cut core maize rations
From 10kg to 5kg a month – or just 600 calories a day –
That’s a quarter of the recommended daily intake.

Years of crop failures
Government’s seizure of white-owned farms
Collapse of the economy
Now shops sell food for US dollars only
And hyperinflation has wiped out the currency’s value
What’s left is a mass of unemployed and desperate people

A Mole’s Point of View

Nic e moist earth
Mm. Just finish this tunnel .
I say, an earthworm, eat that later.
Soft, sandy soil. Mm.
Round the corner, digging, upwards, digging,
Ooh. Light.

They say I’m blind
They say I’m an evolutionary dead-end
They say that I’m a pest.
But I feel more subtlety of soil with my burrowing fingers
Than eyes will ever appreciate.
These same burrowing paws make no dead ends,
And if I am such an evolutionary throwback
Who’s to say that
I wasn’t here first!

Reflections on poetry teaching

Writing from sound inspiration initially seemed rather contrived but it did allow me to write something that felt relevant to me. Writing from sound developed my poetic techniques most, as it was something that I don’t usually do. Writing an ode was fun and made me realise how difficult it is to write rhymes. Similarly, using rhyme as an inspiration didn’t work for me at all. I found it too hard to find words that rhyme and allow me to express something, and I didn’t like the resulting poem.

Using metaphors as a starting point seemed quite good. It made me think in different ways and prevented me from feeling unable to think of anything to write. In a classroom it might help to have some examples of completed metaphors.
I didn’t like feeling that I had to write on demand, partly because that made the writing seem contrived and not something of my own, and partly because my self-consciousness about my lack of expertise got in the way of me enjoying playing with words. Having said that, I did enjoy most of the exercises once I got going and tried not to think about how good or bad the results might be. Several glasses of wine may have helped!

To develop these ideas further, I think it would be important to help children to become comfortable and fluent with these various components of poetry writing, along with others, and then work on combining some of them. I think that a sense of audience is important; without that writing poems can feel bizarre and pointless. Perhaps a lesson might look at the variety of famous poets’ reasons for writing poetry and discuss what can be gained out of writing poems. It seems likely that for many children writing poetry is not something they would do outside of school and reasons for doing it aren’t necessarily evident.

With developing imagery and vocabulary and ensuring the best words are used in the best order, I think it would be good to discuss which bits of a poem work and try and understand why. Developing the ability to evaluate is critical to writing better poems. Establishing drafting and redrafting allows more freedom and enjoyment with words. Looking at examples of poets’ drafts made me more aware of a poem as something that is constructed rather than just plucked out of thin air.

From these exercises I’ve found that how satisfied I am with the result does affect how much I enjoyed it and how much I wanted to carry on. I think it’s important to be allowed to write something that is relevant and say something meaningful. I would say that ensuring that poetry relevant and enjoyable is more important than understanding form and structure. Presentation can be key to giving a satisfactory result and is an element of poetry that is perhaps easier to engage with.
One hour KS2 lesson to poetry writing lesson.

I would want the children to explore writing poetry, enjoy playing with words and write a poem that pleased them. I would focus on using senses, as this is something that is relevant and real to each individual and something everyone is an expert on – what different things feel, look, taste, sound and smell like.

I would bring stimuli into the classroom – soap, fruit or sound recordings, and build up a collection of words related to how these are perceived through the senses. The intention would be to introduce poetry as something that directly relates to individual children’s experience of the world. It would help children find new ways of expressing themselves through broader vocabulary and ideas, and provide a palette of words which could then be used (on cards or equivalent) to be rearranged into poems.

I would introduce a few poems which particularly appeal to the senses and generate a discussion about if, and how, the words used are effective. The lesson would conclude with an individual or small group writing exercise to use some of the words and ideas from the earlier parts of the lesson to write a poem.

I love the idea of bringing in objects that appeal to the senses to write about. I think this would help children to write creatively because they would be able to write about something in front of them looking with fresh eyes.