Spring Sings with Yellow: Two Original Poems

I was trying to figure out what my poetry post would be today. I’ve been really busy lately with a couple of writing projects, making arrangements for our reading council’s spring dinner meeting in mid May, and with plans for my daughter’s upcoming bridal shower and her wedding this summer.

I went looking through my poetry manuscripts to see if I could find a “bright” spring poem. It’s really gray and chilly where I live today. Spring seems to be in hiding…again. I decided to post a poem that would brighten my day. I selected POLLEN from my unpublished collection Spring into Words: A Season in Acrostics. Reading POLLEN inspired to me to write another “yellow” poem for the season. My new “yellow” poem is still in its rough draft stage.

Powder

Of life. Yellow…

Like lantern light,

Like butter on bread, like the yolk of an

Egg, like a nugget of gold…or a

New star born of cosmic dust.

Spring sings with yellow—
Daffodils trumpet the color in a world growing green
Forsythia bushes explode into golden clouds
Dandelions light our lawn like little suns
Daisies flaunt their pollen-powdered faces…
Everywhere I look
Yellow is singing out its bright song.

More Color Poems

PART I

In an earlier Wild Rose Reader post in which I wrote a review of Joyce Sidman’s wonderful new collection of poems about color titled Red Sings from Treetops, Joyce and I invited my blog readers to write and share their own color poems with us. Rebecca took up the poetry challenge. Here is her poem about PINK:

Pink is the color of a warm embrace,

a kiss from Grandma,

a baby’s face.

A wash of color on a sunset sky,

a flush of fever,

a happy sigh.

A cozy cuddle on a cool afternoon,

fragrant blossoms,

a song-bird’s tune.

Pink is all puffy and happy and proud,

bright as the sun,

soft as a cloud.

Jone’s students also wrote some color poems. Jone shared the poems at her blog Check It Out in the following post—Poetry Friday: Color Poems.

I also wrote and posted four original Color Poems.

PART II: Some More Color Poems for You

From Color
by Christina Rossetti

What is pink? a rose is pink
By a fountain's brink.
What is red? a poppy's red
In its barley bed.
What is blue? the sky is blue
Where the clouds float thro'.
What is white? a swan is white
Sailing in the light.

You can read the rest of the poem here.

From Yellow Sonnet

by Paul Zimmer

Zimmer no longer wishes to write

About the dimming of his lights,

Recounting all his small terrors.

Instead he tells of brilliance,

Walking home from first grade

In springtime, light descending

To hold itself and dazzle him

In an outburst of dandelions.

You can read the rest of the poem here.

From Colors Passing through Us
by Marge Piercy

Purple as tulips in May, mauve
into lush velvet, purple
as the stain blackberries leave
on the lips, on the hands,
the purple of ripe grapes
sunlit and warm as flesh.

Every day I will give you a color,
like a new flower in a bud vase
on your desk. Every day
I will paint you, as women
color each other with henna
on hands and on feet.

Red as henna, as cinnamon,
as coals after the fire is banked,
the cardinal in the feeder,
the roses tumbling on the arbor
their weight bending the wood
the red of the syrup I make from petals.

You can read the rest of the poem here.

You can find the children’s poem Taste of Purple by Leland B. Jacobs here.

Part III: Books with Color Poems

Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors
Written by Joyce Sidman
Illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski
Houghton Mifflin, 2009

Read my review of Sidman’s book here.

Color Me a Rhyme: Nature Poems for Young People
Written by Jane Yolen
Photographs by Jason Stemple
Wordsong/Boyds Mills Press, 2000

The poems in this collection focus on the colors one sees in nature: the greens of ferns and trees and grass and leaves; the orange of a sunset sky and lichens growing on rocks; the pink of a thistle flower; the yellow of an autumn leaf; the reds of berries and butterfly wings. In her Note from the Author, Jane Yolen explains how she had asked her photographer son Jason Stemple to find her colors in nature when they discussed collaborating on this book. Stemple shot pictures in the hills of Massachusetts, the mountains of Colorado, and the desert of the Southwest—for two years. Jane then selected the photographs she liked the best to serve as inspiration for the thirteen poems included in this collection.
The pairing of Yolen’s poems with Stemple’s pictures create unified expressions of the different colors written about in the text. In addition to the poems and photographs, words that name the variety of hues in which a color may be found in nature are printed horizontally and vertically in large letters on the pages. For example, on the two-page spread with the poem about purple, readers will find the color words amethyst, orchid, lavender, plum, violet, and wine. Yolen suggests readers write poems from her son’s photos in the book. She says that she included the “extra” color words as an added “incentive.”

The book’s first poem, GREEN, begins…

Whichever angel had the task
of naming greens, squatting
on the hard new ground,
robe guttering at his perfect feet,
did not do his work well.
He gave us chartreuse, olive, leek,
emerald, ivy, beryl.
But they are not nearly enough
when the world is so much green.
Ferns, trees, grass, stems,
petals, limbs, leaves…

How great it would be to share this poem with students and then have them search for different shades of green on the playground at recess, in their own yards, on a walk through a meadow or the woods in the springtime. It would be a fine way to help children learn to become more careful observers of the world around them.

Color Me a Rhyme includes rhymed and unrhymed poems—including four haiku. Pink: A Haiku provides an excellent example of how a poet can perceive an object in nature in a truly imaginative way. Yolen “sees” a thistle flower as a punk hairstyle.

PINK : A HAIKU

A surge of sunlight
Shocks through stem and thistle hairs.
A punk pink hairdo.

The collection closes with Crayons: A Rainbow Poem in which Yolen speaks about a crayon box containing “the wash of blue sky/spikes of green spring/a circle of yellow sun.” the box also holds human diversity: my pink/and your chocolate/and her burnt sienna/and his ivory skin/In it are all the colors of the world.” That’s a fitting way to conclude this fine book of color poems.

Classroom Connection
Color Me a Rhyme would be an excellent springboard for a cross curricular writing/science/photography activity. Students could be asked to look for/point out certain colors in nature while on a walking field trip—or even after school. The children/the teacher/the children's parents could take photographs of leaves, tree bark, soil, flowers, insects, spider webs, etc. Once the photographs were developed or printed out on a computer, children could use them as inspiration for writing their own color poems. Then the teacher could help the children compile their own photographs and poems in a class Color Me A Poem anthology.

Hailstones and Halibut Bones
Written by Mary O’Neill
Illustrated by John Wallner

Hailstones and Halibut Bones was first published way back in 1961. In 1989, it was republished with lovely new illustrations done by John Wallner. This is a book of rhyming list poems about twelve colors—including black, white and gray. In the poems, O’Neill talks about the sights, sounds, smells, and feelings that she associates with particular colors:

Time is purple
Just before night…


Gold is the sunshine
Light and thin
Warm as a muffin
On your skin.


Brown is the color of work
And the sound of a river…

You can hear blue
In wind over water…


Pussywillows are gray
In a velvety way.


Red is a hotness
You get inside
When you’re embarrassed
And want to hide…
And when you’re angry
Red runs through your head.

Green is the coolness
You get in the shade
Of the tall old woods
Where the moss is made.

Think of what starlight
And lamplight would lack
Diamonds and fireflies
If they couldn’t lean against
Black….

Sharing poems from Hailstones and Halibut Bones with children could serve as a good way to get them to talk about/discuss the different things that come to mind when they think about certain colors.

Click here to see a double-page spread from Hailstones and Halibut Bones.

Hailstones and Halibut Bones Lesson Plan (Scholastic)

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Anastasia Suen has the Poetry Friday Roundup at Picture Book of the Day.

Color Poems

Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors

Written by Joyce Sidman

Illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski

Houghton Mifflin, 2009

Write a COLOR POEM
On April 17th, I posted a review of Joyce Sidman’s wonderful new collection of poems entitled Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors. Joyce and I invited my blog readers to write color poems and submit them to Wild Rose Reader for posting at a later date. Unfortunately, no one has submitted a poem yet—so I thought I’d send out a second invitation…along with four color poems that I wrote today. I kept to the seasonal theme just as Joyce did with the poems in her collection. That is not a requirement for your color poems.


NOTE: Joyce developed a Reader’s Guide for her book Red Sings from Treetops. The guide includes ideas and suggestions for writing three different types of color poems: a list poem, a color person poem, and a synesthesia poem. Why not check out her suggestions? You may be inspired to write your own color poem.

Here’s a link to Joyce’s teacher's guide page for Red Sings from Treetops.


My Color Poems

Spring Green
pokes out from the earth
before the last snows melt,
announces the arrival
of impatient crocuses.
It perches on tree branches
like little bitty birds,
spreads itself over the ground
in grassy velvet shawls.
Spring Green sprouts everywhere
in a dazzle of different shades
covering over the drab brown
of winter.



Summer Yellow,
is brazen and bold,
puffs out its chest in July
and shouts from its perch high in the sky:
Hot Hot Hot!
Summer Yellow
sizzles on the sidewalk,
scorches the sandy beach,
sears our skin with its molten hands.
It grows wild in dandelions
before they wither to white.
It powders the faces of daisies
with gold dust.
Summer Yellow
is tart and tangy,
tingles on the tongue...
likes to cool itself in an icy pitcher
of lemonade.



The Orange of October
shines in the face
of a harvest moon,
grows plump and round in pumpkin patches,
flickers in the angled eyes of jack o’ lanterns…
and their crooked copper grins.
The Orange of October
flames in oak leaves and asters,
smells like cinnamon and nutmeg,
tastes like sweet potato pie.


Winter White
whirls in the wind,
waltzes down from clouds,
alights with feathered feet.
It pillows the ground,
muffling the sound of footsteps
on the walk.
Winter White
wraps the rhododendron
in a fluffy shawl,
lays a feathered quilt
over the frozen pond.
Winter White
etches windowpanes
with frosty fingertips.
It whispers through icy lips,
sounds like a ghost
shivering in cold blue shadows.


If you write a color poem, you can leave it in the comments or email it to me.

Red Sings from Treetops: A Book Review & An Invitation

Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors
Written by Joyce Sidman
Illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski
Houghton Mifflin, 2009

A Little Background about How the Book Started
Here’s an excerpt from the interview I did with Joyce Sidman last year.

Elaine: You told me before that your most recent book, This Is Just to Say, came out of your work as a writer-in-residence—that it came pouring out of you in a way that other books haven’t. How long does it usually take for you to write a collection of poems? What is the process like?

Joyce: Well, it’s different for every book, but generally I start with an idea, or an image, or an emotion. I have a book coming out next year called Red Sings from Treetops—it’s about color in nature. This book started with the deep thrill that color gives me: a flaming red maple or the soft green of new buds. But an emotion or image is not enough—I have to figure out a “voice” for the book: a way to write it so that it captures that original emotion. I played around with all sorts of color poems, touching on this idea or that, and then retreating when it didn’t feel right. This happened over the course of a year. Finally one spring I looked down at some tracks in the mud, and a line came into my head: “Look down—brown. Deer were here, and a dainty raccoon.” That line isn’t even in the book anymore, but I knew that I’d found a way in, a way of talking about color as though it were alive. After that, the book took about three months to write and another few months of tinkering. I have to go slowly. If I force it, it’s just bad poetry. And I have to give it time to rest so I can look at it with fresh eyes and see if it still works.

From Joyce Sidman’s website: Color has always had the power to lift my spirits and thrill me. The first time I saw a cardinal on top of a tall tree, singing his heart out in the late winter sun, I thought, "WOW!" On my daily walks, I started looking for color everywhere, in each season. And it WAS everywhere--even in winter. To me, each color seemed like an old friend come alive somehow. This book is my attempt to bring color to life for others, as well.



About the Book
Those of us who know and love Joyce Sidman’s poetry books appreciate all the "tinkering" she does with her poems and all the time she gives them to rest so she can revisit them with “fresh eyes.” Sidman’s poetry for children is exceptional.

I’m happy to say that her newest book is no exception to the “exceptional” standard she set for herself in creating outstanding collections of poetry in the past. In Red Sings from Treetops, she gives readers insight into colors through her novel approach to writing about them. Sidman takes a seasonal look at BLUE and YELLOW and RED and GREEN and other colors—and shows us what they embody during different times of the year. For example, here’s what she writes about the pink of spring and the pink of winter:

SPRING

And here,
in secret places,
peeps Pink:
hairless,
featherless,
the color of
new
things.

WINTER

In the WINTER dawn,
Pink blooms
powder-soft
Over pastel hills.

Pink prickles:
warm fingers
against cold cheeks.

To Sidman, in summer Yellow melts/everything it touches…/smells like butter,/tastes like salt. But in fall, Yellow is a school bus that grows wheels/and lumbers/down the block,/blinking:/Warning—classrooms ahead.

Sidman’s colors are alive. They move and sing and whisper and float and drip and breathe. In spring, RED squirms on the road after rain. PURPLE pours into summer evenings one shadow at a time. BROWN rustles and whispers underfoot in fall. In winter, GREEN waits in the hearts of trees, feeling the earth turn.

This is what the best poetry should do: Help us to look at common subjects with new eyes—help us to appreciate what lies beneath the surface—to see the reality of something as perceived in one’s imagination. Sidman thinks through the “layers” of colors in this collection and introduces us to their varied personalities.

Pamela Zagarenski’s art is the perfect complement for Sidman’s text. Her mixed media illustrations are stunning—and, like the poems, draw us into the seasonal lives of colors. Some pictures burst with brightness—a brilliant orange pumpkin in autumn…a brazen yellow sun in summer. In other pictures, colors are subdued—like the muted green of winter and pale pink of featherless baby birds in spring.

Write and Share a Color Poem
Last year, when I interviewed Joyce Sidman during National Poetry Month, she and I invited my blog readers to write poems of apology like the ones Joyce had written for her book This Is Just to Say. This year, I asked if she’d like me to invite people to write their own color poems.

Here’s what Joyce wrote:
I love to write color poems with the students I teach in my writer-in-residence weeks at local schools. We try to employ "synesthesia" (see my teacher's guide page: http://www.joycesidman.com/redsingsTG.html) and use all five senses. They really enjoy it, and have definite feelings about certain colors. One beautiful line from a ten-year-old is "Red dances on the sun like a freed slave."

It would be fun to see what your readers could come up with--if you want, you could refer them to the teacher's guide page, and they could write one of the three kinds of color poems I have listed???

Here are a couple of poems that I posted previously at Wild Rose Reader. I didn’t write them as “color” poems—but they both touch on the subject.

Watermelon slice

I sink my teeth in

Savoring succulent flesh

Juice dribbling down my chin

Eating my way down

To a broad green grin

Green carpets the ground,

Reaches over the hills, blankets the broad valley,

And across the wide prairie, stalks of tall golden grain

Sway in the wind

Singing the song of the plain.


NOTE: Poem and artwork from Red Sings from Treetops by Joyce Sidman, illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski. (c) 2009. Used by permission of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.

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The Poetry Friday Roundup is at Becky’s Book Reviews this week.

At Blue Rose Girls today--POETRY FRIDAY: Opposite Poems

At Political Verses today--Gasbag: A Limbaughrhyme

Colorful Poetry

Here are three poems I am submitting for Tricia’s Monday Poetry Stretch--Colorful Poetry.


Green carpets the ground,

Reaches over the hills, blankets the broad valley,

And across the wide prairie, stalks of tall golden grain

Sway in the wind

Singing the song of the plain.




Red is the

Only color for a rose.

Save your buds of cloud white, dawn yellow, sunset pink.

Every rose should be red.



Pink Is the Color of…

A baby’s fingers,
a baby’s toes,
a piglet’s tail,
a bunny’s nose,

a happy memory,
the way
honeybees buzz
on a sunny day,

the scent
of apple blossoms,
spring,
the fluttery sound
of fairies’ wings

the feel of velvet
on my skin,
of ice cream
melting down my chin,

the taste of
cotton candy, too--
and hot dogs
at a barbecue!



Check out Tricia’s post Poetry in the Classroom--Colorful Poetry.