I Wish I'd Written This

I HAVE A RIVER

I have a river

in my back yard.

The sun is a fish

in the sky.

My dad likes

to catch fish

with his feet.

There is a fish

that likes to jump

on the moon.

At night

the fish creates fire

by hammering

two moon rocks together

with a fishing pole

so he can cook himself up

in the morning

for breakfast.

Javon, 5th Grade

Fitzgerald Elementary

Detroit Public Schools

If you think poems like this one need to be written and heard, I hope you'll consider pitching in on August 18th to keep the river flowing.

Click here to donate to the InsideOut Literary Arts Project and watch your gift grow thanks to the Community Foundation Challenge Grant. http://www.cfsem.org/insideout-literary-arts-project

If fishes were wishes, I'd have a bucket filled with gold.

Fish on,

Peter Markus

More Poems from the Locomotion Sessions: Today I Want To Yell

Here's another poem written during one of the Locomotion sessions. I'd say it speaks for itself:

Today I Want To Yell

 

thinking of

my grandma

who

lives in

heaven.

She is

the biggest

star

in the sky.

I wish

she would

come

back to me

but

that's not

my grandma

that's just

the shell.

My grandma

is still

at home

playing

diamonds

drinking

her pop

and eating

crackers.

Every

night

before

I go to bed

I say

"I love you."

Just them

three words

and then

"don't let

the bed

bugs bite"

because

they

will.

 

Jasmine Johnson

Golightly Educational Center

A Poet's Heart

With two of my classes, a 5th grade class at Golightly Educational Center and a class of 4th graders at Mark Twain, we read Jacqueline Woodson's novel-in-verse Locomotion.

Locomotion tells the story of 11-year-old Lonnie Collins Motion who lost his mother and father to a house fire when he was seven. This tragedy shapes and haunts who Lonnie is and becomes the source of his poetry when his teacher introduces him to the power of words. 

My students really identified with Lonnie's story (I plan to talk about this more in a later post) and Lonnie's poems take many poetic forms (from haiku to epistle) that make this book a very teachable, meaningful book for the poetry classroom.

Lonnie, as his teacher tells him near the end of the book, has the heart of a poet.

Here's a poem written by Ryan Estmond who, like Lonnie, has a poet's heart too:

A Poet's Heart

I have a
poet's heart, filled with

poetry, gifted
with love

inside my
poetry

heart.

I am gifted
with a

poet's heart
and blessed with love and

poetry inside
my heart.

Ryan Estmond

I hope to post some more poems inspired by Locomotion in the days and weeks to come.