Thursday, April 29, 2010

Penfield Poetry Due Today!

Penfield Poetry Due Today! Please include a title page with your poem. Submission is required. Please submit your poems through email: lgrills@libraryweb.org (please attach the word file as an attachment, and in the subject line, please write: Poetry Contest.

Complete your drafts of the 3x5 poems and the Art poem.

Do the following assignment:

Go to the following website and browse. Buy a t-shirt, find resources to help your own poetry writing, get ideas from reading some poems teens like.

Choose 3 poems from "poems for teens" to read and comment on. What do you think? Like it? Not like it? Why? Why not? Have you thought about writing something similar? What do you notice the poet doing well in the poem? Notice any literary devices being used? Would you recommend it to another teen? An adult you know? Your commentary should be turned in by the end of class.

Then spend your time looking at other parts of this website.

9 comments:

Alex said...

Okay.

The first poem I read was Alice at Seventeen: Like a Blind Child.

I have to admit, I didn't really like it. The title and poem DO relate, basically about how trippy Alice in Wonderland is, but the poem itself doesn't connect with me. There were too many in-depth descriptions for my taste. Yes, the metaphors were good, but I'm more of a simplicity style writer, not "SUPER IN-DEPTH DESRICTIONS".

Cicada:

My first thought: "I'M LOST. WHERE IS THIS POEM TAKING ME?"

Now that I read the poem, I can understand it...a bit. The author is trying to get across that once you turn a certain age, childhood is just a memory, and adulthood is your new companion.

Persephone, Falling:

Mythology allusion ftw.

I'm biased about this poem, so I'm going to merely say I liked it. It had mythology, which is awesome. But I do have to say, the author formatted this somewhat awkwardly.

Kennethea said...

I Am!
by John Clare

I recommend this poem to teens. This poem had a nice rhythmic structure to it that caught my attention. Each stanza, the last words of the last two lines rhymed. This poem is also similar to a Shakespearean sonnet. I can really relate to "I Am". My most favorite line is "My friends forsake me like a memory lost;". This was a nice metaphoric way so friends can be backstabbing.


Sticks
by Thomas Sayers Ellis

This is a very remorseful poem about a father who has the typical kind of demeanor as most men do, unemotional and show little signs of weakness. But there is a lesson to be taught with this poem. "Sticks" really emphasized that you should never judge one by who they come off to be because deep down inside they might be a different person. This is a very important lesson that should be embedded in teens today.


A Muse
by Reginald Shepherd

This poem depicts the struggle of an adolescent growing into a man. The author doesn't just come out and say as much. He uses nature as his tool to tell his story. This is a very cliche plot structure but the overall message is more effective than how he wrote the poem.

marissa said...

the first poem that I read was That Sure is My Little Dog by Eleanor Lerman
I thought that the poem was good i like the imagery it was as if you could see her holding her house on her back as a shield. I think that she could have broken up her poem into stanzas because when you first look at the poem, it looks like it is a paragraph and not a poem. I like how she ended the poem with Have a nice day.

The next poem that i read was Ballad by Sonia Sanchez
i really liked this poem it had some humor and talked about true things. I believe that some people are too young to say that they are in love. The poem ws short but went to the point. I liked how she used repetition at the end of her stanzas.

The last poem that I read was Alice at Seventeen: Like a Blind Child by Darcy Cummings
At first I thought that this poem was good but then it had too much detail. I don't think that it needed it that much. The metaphors were good too. I think that she could have broke up her poem a little bit to have more than one stanza. other than that the poem is not too bad.

Anonymous said...

The first poem I read was "Making a Fist"by Naomi Shihab Nye. I enjoyed ths poem even though I was somewhat confused when I read it, I had to read this over and think about it analytically. I like the moral of her poem which is basically saying that you will keep yourself alive and successful if you keep making a fist(metaphorically speaking...never giving up.) I would recommend this poem to a teenager or adult if they need something to give me a boost of a confidence.

The second poem I read was called "Notes from the other side" by Jane Kenyon. I can honestly say that I am still completely confused about this poem. This poem is either not "teenage friendly" or it's just extremely in depth...I can't quite figure out which one it is. But my only guess is that it is talking about the dead. I won't recommend this poem for anyone until I can understand it for myself!

The last poem I read was "Alice at Seventeen:Like a Blind Child." Simply put...I don't like it. It took too long for me to understand it so I didn't have any special feelings toward it.

jeneeskinner said...

Ave Maria
By Frank O’Hara

This poem was true to many of the “Mothers of America” aka the Ave Maria…s.
Good parents can still make the same mistakes bad parents make which normal. Not to mention it entails the atrocities of normal teen life.

A Muse
By Reginald Shepherd

This is the closest a poem has ever gotten to my juxtaposition, which is almost frightening as it is intriguing. Besides the fact, the main character of the poem is a type of man that doesn’t exist, and if he did he’d unattainable…so there’s an instant attraction.

Making a Fist
Naomi Shihab Nye

To be this wise is a blessing I had, to answer your five year-old’s inane questions is an accomplishment in itself. But what was so true to heart was how poetic her truth sounded about “unanswerable woes” in which we all are faced with.

Shayla said...

Eating Poetry by Mark Strand

The first line "Ink runs from the corners of my mouth." really grabbed my attention but i got lost during the rest of the poem. Obviously the poem is a big metaphor but i get confused because he describes the dog in third person and then he "metaphorically" becomes the dogs he's describing? i guess its poetic.

Homage to my Hips by Lucille Clifton

I think the main reason why i like this song is because i was able to hear her perform it and heard the emphasis and strain she put on certain word which is a good technique for spoken word. But i also like the way how she took what some women would be insecure about and talked about the advantages she gets from it.

That Sure is my Dog by Eleanor Lerman

i thought that this poem was too long and that it did'nt really make a lot of sense to me at first she was talking about her life then she talked about her dog. i think that she could have put some stanzas into her poem.

monica35002 said...

Eating Poetry by Mark Strand

I liked this poem. It is different from other ones I’ve heard before. I’ve never thought about writing anything similar to it but now I would like to. I think the poet did very well in this poem and reading it I had a clear image in my head. I really liked the lines “Ink runs from the corners of my mouth. There is no happiness like mine. I have been eating poetry.” I would recommend this poem to other teens so they can see different types of poems that they might not be used to.



White Apples by Donald Hall

I didn’t like this poem because I didn’t understand the poem very much. I didn’t understand the significance of the “ white apples and the taste of stone “. I think the author should get into more depth of the significance of the white apples, since it’s the title of the poem. I don’t think I would recommend this poem to other teens.


Patience by Kay Ryan

I liked this poem. The author creates a more understanding of “patience” and gives it more meaning. I would recommend this to other teens as well. I’ve thought about writing something similar to this and now this poem makes me want to do it more.

alaina said...

Eating Poems by Mark Strand
I think this poem was very interesting because he was writing from the perspective of a dog, which is a very unusual kind of personification. I think it was very successful. I have never thought about writing a poem like form the view of anyone besides a human.

nautica said...

The poem "In loving memory of the late Author of Dream Songs" was interesting. I wouldn't necessarily say it's my favorite poem but i wouldn't say I didn't like it. It was mainly about the death of an author, that made an impact on the poets life. I haven't really thought about writing about impacts. The poet used a lot of extended metaphors so that made it a little difficult. I wouldn't refer it to a teenager, but an adult might find it more interesting.

I liked the poem "Death Barged In". It was short and to the point. It expressed how we ever know what we have until it's gone. I have written poems with this type of message before, and it's very effective to me. It used a lot of imagery which helps the author connect to the poem better. I would refer this poem to both teens and adults.

I loved the poem "To Speak of Who that is in Marriage". This poem was about a failing marriage, this poem was effective because it can easily be related to. I write about failing relationships all the time. So I immediately connected with the poem. This poem used a lot of metaphors and imagery and i connected to this as well because i use the same literary elements in my writing as well. I would refer this poem to both teens and adults as well.

About this course!

This course stresses understanding the characteristics & techniques in the literary genres of fiction, poetry, and dramatic writing. This course will continue to build on students’ reading and writing skills begun in previous creative writing classes. Readings and discussions of works by major writers in the field will be examined as inspiration and models of fine writing. This educational blog is designed for the use of the students at the School of the Arts in Rochester, NY.