H is for Haiku and More: Let's Look at the Best in Poetry, Shall We?

In the new nonfiction book, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, author Yuval Noah Harari writes, "Yet the truly unique feature of our language is not its ability to transmit information about men and lions. Rather, it’s the ability to transmit information about things that do not exist at all."

Poetry is the best gift we humans have been given. It has brought us out of the swamps, and it can help us get through this disaster and all the others we face.

It's Poetry Month.

Let's celebrate poetry, shall we?

WONDERFUL POETRY FOR CHILDREN

It doesn't have to be these books, but all of these are a great place to start, if you don't know where to begin.

Here's a Little Poem: A Very First Book of Poetry collected by Jane Yolen and Andrew Fusek Peters and illustrated by Polly Dunbar

My Very First Mother Goose edited by Iona Opie and illustrated by Rosemary Wells

Read-Aloud Rhymes for the Very Young selected by Jack Prelutsky and illustrated by Marc Brown

Hand Rhymes collected and illustrated by Marc Brown

H is for Haiku by Sydell Rosenberg and illustrated by Sawsan Chalabi

Poetry for Young People: William Carlos Williams

Poetry Speaks to Children edited by Elise Paschen

Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein

WONDERFUL POETRY FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry edited by Ellmann and O'Clair

Staying Alive: Real Poems for Unreal Times edited by Noel Astley

Poetry 180 selected by Billy Collins

WONDERFUL POETRY FOR GROWNUPS

The Penguin Anthology of 20th Century American Poetry edited by Rita Dove

A Poem a Day edited by Karen McCosker and Nicholas Albery

Good Poems selected by Garrison Keillor

Americans' Favorite Poems: The Favorite Poem Project Anthology 

edited by Robert Pinsky and Maggie Dietz

Sailing Alone Around the World: New and Selected Poems by Billy Collins

Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver by Mary Oliver

What would you add to this list? Do you have other favorite books of poetry that I have missed? I'd love to hear your recommendations.

Poem in a Pocket Day: April 30th

Here we are back in 2018, celebrating Poem in a Pocket Day at school. Children made pockets to wear around their necks, and inside the pocket was a poem or two to read. I had guest listeners (parents, teachers) at school to listen to children as they read their poems. The guest listeners gave the children stickers to put on their pockets after the successful completion of the reading.

It was always great fun. We found that PreK and Kinder kids sometimes enjoyed reading their poems as a choral reading, with 3-5 kids in a group. Some children would take on five or six poems, and some wrote their own poems.

April 30 is National Poem in a Pocket Day. Here are ways to celebrate from the website:

• Select a poem and share it on social media using the hashtag #pocketpoem. 
• Simultaneously participate in the Shelter in Poems initiative, and select a poem that brings you solace during this time of distance and solitude. Share what it means to you and use the hashtags #pocketpoem and #ShelterInPoems.
• Print a poem from the Poem in Your Pocket Day PDF and draw an image from the poem in the white space, or use the instructions on pages 59-60 of the PDF to make an origami swan. 
• Record a video of yourself reading a poem, then share it on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, or another social media platform you use. 
• Email a poem to your friends, family, neighbors, or local government leaders.
• Schedule a video chat and read a poem to your loved ones.
• Add a poem to your email footer.
• Read a poem out loud from your porch, window, backyard or outdoor space. 

Books I Wish I Had Read As a Child

I read a lot of books when I was a child, and I had wonderful school and public libraries when I was a child, but I still missed a lot of great books. Here are some I wish I had read as a child.

BOOKS I MISSED AS A CHILD BECAUSE THEY WEREN'T WRITTEN YET

Because of Winn-Dixie by Kate DiCamillo
The Adventures of Treehorn by Florence Parry Heide, illustrated by Edward Gorey
Frog and Toad are Friends by Arnold Lobel
The Giver by Louis Lowry
I Want My Hat Back by Jon Klassen
The Napping House by Audrey Wood, illustrated by Don Wood
King Bidgood's in the Bathtub by Audrey Wood, illustrated by Don Wood
Press Here by Herve Tullet
Redwall by Brian Jacques
Where is the Green Sheep? by Mem Fox, illustrated by Judy Horacek
The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli
Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein
Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus by Mo Willems
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor
Parvana's Journey by Deborah Ellis
The Summer Book by Tove Jansson
I am the Messenger by Marcus Zusak
Skellig by David Almond
Not Now, Bernard by David McKee
Crocodile Beat by Gail Jorgensen
Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling
The BFG by Roald Dahl
Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
The Duck in the Gun by Joy Cowley
Mr. Fox by Gavin Bishop
Mister Magnolia by Quentin Blake

BOOKS I MISSED AS A CHILD BECAUSE THEY WERE NOT TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH YET OR THEY JUST WEREN'T AVAILABLE HERE IN AMERICA

Viking's Dawn by Henry Treece
The Rose and the Ring by William Makepeace Thackeray
The Letter for the King by Tonke Dragt
The Ship That Flew by Hilda Lewis
Tow-Truck Pluk by Annie M. G. Schmidt
The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff
Just William by Richmal Crompton
Worzel Gummidge by Barbara Euphan Todd
A Long Way from Verona by Jane Gardam
The Dolphin Crossing by Jill Paton Walsh
Ash Road by Ivan Southall
The Adventures of Polly and the Wolf by Catherine Storr
Hairy Maclary by Lynley Dodd
Hobberty Dick by Katharine M. Briggs
Milly-Molly-Mandy Stories by Joyce Lankester Brisley
Five Children and It by E. Nesbit
The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawn by Norman Hunter
The Elephant and the Bad Baby by Elfrida Vipont
The Church Mice by Graham Oakley
Old Bear by Jane Hissey

BOOKS I MISSED AS A CHILD BECAUSE...WELL, I DON'T KNOW WHY I MISSED THEM!

The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
The 13 Clocks by James Thurber
Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery
The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes
My Father's Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett
The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle
The Mouse and His Child by Russell Hoban
The Biggest Bear by Lynd Ward
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis
Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans


Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.

Still Coughing, Mildred D. Taylor Books, and Free Library Cards

I'm still coughing, but I have (hopefully) turned a corner this week and I'm coughing much less. I'm still not sure what I had (or have) but I'm trying to do all the things I've seen suggested for getting well. I'm staying away from others, of course, but I'm also eating citrus, taking an elderberry supplement, taking a Cold-Eze tablet each day, finishing my antibiotic, getting outside each day for a shot of sunshine, and drinking lots of hot water with lemon. 

Anyone else have any home remedies for a cold or the flu? 

The first time I read Mildred D. Taylor's Newberry-winning novel, Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, I almost wept. Taylor's story is based on stories of her father and his extended family in Mississippi in the 1930s. The story is set on a farm that the family just manages to keep going during the difficult times of the Great Depression, with the father and mother both working additional jobs in order to keep their land. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry sounded like the stories my dad told of his growing up years in north Louisiana, not thirty miles from where Roll of Thunder takes place, but with one key difference: the Logans were black and my dad's family was white. I felt compelled to question my dad about the differences. Did the white children have a bus that took them to their white school while the black children walked, often miles, to school? Yes, my dad told me, that was true. Were black adults made to defer to white children on the sidewalks of town? Yes, again my dad said that was true. Were black people generally under the control of the white plantation owners on which they were sharecroppers? Yes, true again. And on and on. I was shocked.

All the Days Past, All the Days to Come by Mildred D. Taylor takes place just before and during my own childhood, and I could remember hearing about the efforts of black people to be allowed full equality with whites, by lunch counter sit-ins and voting test preparations and bus rides through the south. This time, though, I was sitting at the counter with Cassie, facing white restaurant owners refusing to serve her, and I was with Cassie preparing black friends to take grueling voting tests on which blacks were quizzed about details of the Mississippi Constitution and I was riding in a car with Cassie and just ahead was a white roadblock, with men who held guns and had the power to take Cassie and me to jail on a whim.

You can't read this story and not be changed.

The Houston Public Library is currently offering free library cards to anyone in Texas. (Non-Texas residents may purchase a one-year membership for $40.) Through Hoopla and Overdrive, I've been able to find just about everything I'd like to read. Of course, there are long lines for the ebooks on Overdrive as these can only be checked out one at a time. I'm reading books as they come in for me at Overdrive.

I celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of Earth Day with a listing of all my favorite nature books for adults and for children: The 50th Anniversary of Earth Day: Books You Might Like to Read Now.

In my quest to read all of the 1001 Children's Books, I have run up against many obstacles, and this week I posed the question, Does It Count? Yes or No, to you, asking for help in resolving difficulties I've had in deciding whether I have truly read a book or not.

The City Nature Challenge 2020 is a citizen science project taking place all around the world. It begins on Friday, April 24 and runs through Monday, April 27. It is open to adults, teens, and children, and it is designed to find and document wild plant life and wild animal life using an easy phone app called iNaturalist. If you'd like to find out more or join in, take a look here.

1. I'm coughing less.

2. I haven't had to go to the doctor's office.

3. My husband hasn't gotten sick.

Thank you for coming to the Sunday Salon. There are no real requirements for linking up at Sunday Salon. Sunday Salon is a great way to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 

Some of the things we often talk about at the Sunday Salon:

• What was your week like?
• Read any good books? Tell us about them.
• What other bookish things did you do? 
• What else is going on in your life?

Other places where you may like to link up over the weekend are below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

My linkup for Sunday Salon is below.