Poetry in Prose: Memory Wall

I am just about finished with Memory Wall by Anthony Doerr. It's his second collection of stories and I am mentioning it here on my poetry blog, and highly recommending it, because it reads like a book of poetry. 

When I think of poetry, I think of pieces where every word is chosen deliberately, with great precision. Every word matters in a poem. Changing just one of them--taking one away or adding one more--changes the entire thing. The words of a poem fit together perfectly and they work together to make you think and feel things you didn't know you could.

This is exactly the case in Memory Wall. These stories are exquisite in every way. Doerr needs to win every award possible for this collection. It's not very often that I read fiction and find it so moving, so beautifully created that it reminds me of poetry. Really good poetry. But that, my friends, is the case here.

Please check this book out and you'll see what I mean. I also recommend The Shell Collector, Doerr's first collection of stories, which I'll be re-reading very soon. Let me know what you think.

Poetry Classics: Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Once again this winter, here in Michigan we are buried under snow. During the past seven days, almost all of the 12 or so inches on the ground melted away. But apparently winter isn't over yet because Sunday night we were pounded with about another foot.

"Watching it Snow at Night" is right up there with "Mountains on the Horizon" and "Waterfalls" and "Sunsets" and "The Sound of the Ocean" on my "Things in Nature I Love" list. And whenever I take a moment to watch or, even better, stand outside in, the falling flakes in the nighttime, my mind often turns to one of my favorite poems, "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening."

I think I first heard this poem as an elementary school student. Naturally, I was drawn to its near perfect meter and its exquisite rhyme scheme. I return to it often in my teaching and somehow it always comes to mind when there's an evening snowfall. It's ingrained in my memory, for sure. I'd also guess it's one of the most widely known poems in American history. And for good reason. There are some poems that truly will live on forever. And this has to be one of them...

Whose woods these are I think I know.   

His house is in the village though;   

He will not see me stopping here   

To watch his woods fill up with snow.   

My little horse must think it queer   

To stop without a farmhouse near   

Between the woods and frozen lake   

The darkest evening of the year.   

He gives his harness bells a shake   

To ask if there is some mistake.   

The only other sound’s the sweep   

Of easy wind and downy flake.   

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.   

But I have promises to keep,   

And miles to go before I sleep,   

And miles to go before I sleep.

I think the opening image of the speaker trespassing in the woods is a great one. But it's the last stanza that gets me. That intentional repetition reinforcing the remaining journey leaves a lasting impression and probably resonates with anyone who has ever walked the earth.

You might enjoy the version of this poem illustrated by Susan Jeffers:

It's one of the books in my collection that I treasure the most.

So wherever you are, and however many feet of snow you are buried beneath, I hope you enjoyed a few moments with this classic poem.

Poetry Book Review: Face by Sherman Alexie

Sometimes you get the hiatus, sometimes the hiatus gets you. I hadn't intended to take such a long break from blogging, but life kept getting in the way. I have found some time to read some really good books, though. Like Face by Sherman Alexie.

Alexie has written some high quality short stories and novels, but I find his poems to be just as good. Face is Alexie at his best...humorous, insightful, and creative. And the topics are incredibly wide-ranging--from children to memory to marriage to life on the reservation and more.

In some of the best poems, he combines poetry and prose, almost interrupting himself, like he does in a poem called "Inappropriate."

A lot of the poems fall under the "narrative" category, like "Missed Connections," a poem about mishearing a sentence during an airplane ride. Alexie tells stories just as well in poems as he does in his novels.

I leave you with a poem about fatherhood, "How to Create an Agnostic," which is one of my favorites from the book.

How To Create an Agnostic

Singing with my son,

I clapped my hands
Just as lightning struck.

It was dumb luck.

But my son, awed, thought
I’d created the electricity.

He asked, “Dad, how'd you do that?”

Before I could answer,
thunder shook the house

And set off neighborhood car alarms.

“Dad,” he said. “Can you burn
down that tree outside my window?

The one that looks like a giant owl?”

O, my little disciple, my one boy choir,
I can’t do that

because your father,
your half-assed messiah,

is afraid of fire.

© 2008 Sherman Alexie

The Gift of Poetry

Unexpected gifts are always a double-edged sword for me. Maybe it's my personality, I don't know. Before the Christmas break, a teacher I work with gave me a poetry anthology called Teaching With Fire. I thought this was incredibly thoughtful and I was touched that she would think enough of me to remember my love of poetry when picking me out a gift. On top of that, it was completely unexpected, making it all the more meaningful. I only felt bad because I hadn't bought anything for her, hence the double-edged sword effect.

Don't worry, I got over it and soon found that there are lots of great poems contained within (despite its slightly cheesy subtitle: "Poetry That Sustains The Courage To Teach"). The poems are accompanied by vignettes written by the educators who selected them, too, and most of them are pretty interesting.

So if you're a teacher and you like poetry anthologies like I do, even if you never read anything but the poems, this is a pretty good collection. And I think it would make a great gift for a colleague or a teacher-friend as well. I know I've enjoyed it.

Finally, here's one of my favorite poems from the book. It's by the great William Stafford:

The Way It Is


There's a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn't change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can't get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time's unfolding.
You don't ever let go of the thread.

It's one of many in Teaching with Fire that were new to me. If you get a chance to check out this book, I hope you enjoy it.

What I'm Reading or How To Be a Nerd

Figured out two ways to know you're a total nerd recently (and, yes, I do both):

1. When you're out at the bookstore and you see a book you want to read, you snap a picture of the cover with your phone.

What? You don't do that? Oh, um...neither do I. Ok, yeah, I do. I don't always have pen and paper handy when I'm chillin'at Barnes & Noble. And this way a list of books that I want to read or buy for my classroom is always on hand. Unfortunately, though, it has only helped me to increase my already ginormous WTR  list, because lately the books I want to read are never available at the library!

2. You know the Dewey Decimal number of the poetry section by heart.

Now this one seems way less nerdy, but equally helpful. No matter what library I'm in, I always know exactly where to head to look for some good, new poetry books. This week I picked up E.E. Cummings: Selected Poems, edited by Richard S. Kennedy.

I've always been fascinated by Cummings. His poems are like puzzles to me. I enjoy them for their uniqueness,without the need to "figure them out." I'm discovering a lot of new ones in this book and I'm loving it. I didn't know much more than "[anyone lived in a pretty how town]," which my wife perfectly described as "depressingly brilliant." As in, Cummings wows you with his genius, but leaves you feeling like you're just a few hairs away from being smart enough to understand him. I, personally, am okay with that. In fact, I'm reveling in it as I explore his poems.

One of the best parts about this book are the chapter introductions by Kennedy. He provides interesting and relevant biographical information about Cummings as well as insight into some of his poems. Not too much to be overwhelming. Just enough to enrich the reading. For example, did you know that E.E. stands for Edward Estlin? (He went by Estlin, though). There's much more info beyond that, such as the fact that E.E. was an artist and that the Cubist school appealed to him. This makes total sense when you think about it, with the way Cummings played with line and punctuation and seemed to break all the rules, yet did so in a beautiful way.

So if you're a Cummings fan, or even if you're not, I highly recommend this book. I'll try to share some of the poems I'm enjoying as I discover them, so stay tuned.

Poetry Book Review: Time You Let Me In

Time You Let Me In: 25 Poets Under 25 was a book I discovered at the library earlier this year. The poems were selected by one of my poetry heroes, Naomi Shihab Nye. I pretty much have to own anything with her name on it. She's a gifted poet and, for my money, might be the best selector of poems for anthologies working today.

There are some wonderful poems within Time You Let Me In, most by poets you've probably never heard of--I know I hadn't.

Some of my favorites include "Photons" by Nicole Guenther, which has a glorious ending (I'm a sucker for poems with good endings), "foundling," a superb prose poem by Matthew Baker, and "Rootless" by Michelle Brittan, an excellent poem about much more than mung bean sprouts. You also will enjoy Baker's "Ode to Poetry," a hilariously sarcastic poem that turns the ode form on its head, to say the least. My students certainly loved it, although I had to read them a slightly edited version.

I think this book would provide some very teachable poems for middle and high school teachers, although the poems listed above were thoroughly enjoyed by my fifth graders this spring.

Do you know this collection? Do you have a favorite among them or maybe another anthology I should be sure to get my hands on? Please let me know.