2010 Bank Street College Children's Book Awards Announced!

The Children’s Book Committee of Bank Street College’s School of Education has announced its 2010 book awards. It will be honoring the five books at its annual breakfast and ceremony on March 18th.

I was thrilled when I found out that my good friend Grace Lin had received yet another acknowledgement for her Newbery Honor Winner Where the Mountain Meets the Moon. Grace’s book and Jacqueline Kelly’s The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate share this year's Josette Frank Award for Fiction.

About the Josette Frank Award: “This award is given each year to honor a book or books of outstanding literary merit in which children or young people deal in a positive and realistic way with difficulties in their world and grow emotionally and morally.”

The 2010 Claudia Lewis Poetry Award Winner is Joyce Sidman’s Red Sings from Treetops: A Year in Colors. This fine poetry book, illustrated by Pamela Zagarenski, is also the recipient of a Caldecott Honor Award and the 2009 Cybils Poetry Award.

Click here to find out what other wonderful children’s books were honored by Bank Street College this year.

Congratulations to all the award winners!

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Previously posted at Wild Rose Reader:
Looking Back: Where the Mountain Meets the Moon
Red Sings from Treetops: A Book Review & An Invitation

My Cat Is in Love with the Goldfish

On Wednesday, a package I had been waiting for arrived from across the Atlantic. The package contained several copies of My Cat Is in Love with the Goldfish and Other Loopy Love Poems, a new anthology of light verse that was just published in the UK. The book was compiled by British poet and anthologist Graham Denton.

My Cat Is in Love with the Goldfish
Chosen by Graham Denton
A & C Black, 2010

Most of the poets whose works are included in the book are British—but there are also poems by a few Americans—J.Patrick Lewis, Kenn Nesbitt—and me.

The anthology is divided into eight different sections:

- Animal Magnetism
- The Stuff of Fairy Tales
- Doomed Love
- Monster Love
- A Perfect Match
- The Food of Love
- Monster Love
- Do You Love Me or Do You Not?


I Wish I had Your Picture… (Anonymous) can be found in Animal Magnetism.

I wish I had your picture—
It would be very nice.
I’d hang it in the attic
To scare away the mice.

Not exactly what you were expecting in the way of a LOVE poem?

Maybe you’ll find my poem Jack and June, which is included in The Stuff of Fairy Tales, a bit more romantic:

JACK AND JUNE
by Elaine Magliaro

Jack and June went to the moon,

Crash-landed in a crater.

Jack broke his nose and seven toes.

(He’s a crummy navigator!)

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Jack cried in pain. June tried in vain

To soothe her injured mate.

She bound his toes and kissed his nose

And asked him for a date.

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Jack and June began to swoon…

Fell mad in love and they

Returned to Earth, their place of birth…

And wed the very next day.

Also included in The Stuff of Fairy Tales is Rapunzel! Rapunzel! by Kenn Nesbitt.

From Rapunzel! Rapunzel!

"Rapunzel! Rapunzel! You've cut off your hair!
Your billowing tresses are no longer there.
That mohawk you're sporting is spiky and pink.
I'm really not certain just what I should think.

"I came here expecting to clamber a braid,
ascending your tower to come to your aid.
Instead I have suffered the greatest of shocks
to find that you've cut off your lovely blonde locks."

You can read the rest of the poem here.

Graham Denton has a humorous couplet of his own in A Perfect Match section.

On the Very First Valentine’s Day
by Graham Denton

What the caveman gave his missus—
Lots and lots of Ughs and kisses.

I think Monster Love may be the favorite section of the anthology with young kids.

Colin West’s Sir Hector gives you a flavor of Monster Love.

From Sir Hector
by Colin West

Sir Hector was a spectre
And he loved a lady ghost;
At midnight he’d collect her
And he’d drive her to the coast.

You can read the rest of the poem here.


In Monster Love, Tony Mitton has a poem called Valientine.

Here’s an excerpt from it:

An alien valentine in verse
from elsewhere in the universe.
(Heaven above. It must be love)

Dear Alien, I love you
with your 13 legs
and your hair so blue
and your beautiful tentacles
covered with goo.

A sampling of titles of other poems included in the book:
Pig’s Song of Courtship (John Mole), The Skunk and the Porcupine (Kenn Nesbitt), Dragon Love Poem (Roger Stevens), Deadly Affectionate (Trevor harvey), Sheila Shorter Sought a Suitor (Anon), Love at First Bite (Andy Seed), Dancing with Frankenstein (Robert Scotellaro), and Love Letter—from the Wizard to the Witch (John Foster).

My Cat is in Love with the Goldfish is certainly full of lots of “loopy love poems” that will make kids chuckle.

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At Blue Rose Girls, I have the poem Thumbprint by Eve Merriam—as well as a discussion about innate talent and my road to writing children’s poetry.

Irene has the Poetry Friday Roundup at Live. Love. Explore!

2009 Cybils Winners Announced!

I served as a Round II Cybils Poetry Judge. Here’s the book that won the 2009 Cybils Poetry Award. It's an exceptional book of poetry and art! It is also a recipient of a 2010 Caldecott Honor Award.

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

Observation, discovery, connection . . . Red Sings From the Treetops embodies everything poetry is meant to be. The vivid words of poet Joyce Sidman -- which are fresh even when writing about the oldest of concepts, color -- and the gloriously hue-soaked pictures of illustrator Pamela Zagarenski combine to create a poetry book that is both thoughtful and exuberant. Readers can hunt for small details in the sweep of larger images and thrill to a-ha! moments of discovery. They can read the book as one full, circular story or as a series of individual, eye-opening poems. Either way, the beauty of this book will leave them feeling connected to something larger than themselves.

Click here to find out which books won awards in all categories.

Read all about the Cybils Awards here.

Poetry Books about Winter

It's still winter--that's for sure. Here are some short reviews of poetry books about winter activities and winter weather...in case you're looking for some poems about the coldest season to share with children.

Winter Eyes
Written & illustrated by Douglas Florian
Greenwillow, 1999

Winter Eyes is one of my favorite Douglas Florian books. It was also a poetry favorite in my elementary school library. The collection contains twenty-eight poems about all kinds of wintertime subjects—sledding, icicles, ice fishing, animal tracks in the snow, sugaring time, ice skating, animals in underground burrows, and cabin fever. It includes concrete and list poems. Most of the poems are short, rhyming, rhythmic..

The first poem in the book, Winter Eyes, begins this way:

Look at winter
With winter eyes,
As smoke curls from rooftops
To clear cobalt skies.


In The Winter Sun, Florian personifies the star of our solar system. The sun’s “a grumpy guy” who “doesn’t speak.”

He hovers near the naked trees,
His blanket from the sky’s big freeze,
And barely dares to lift his head
Before he’s ordered back to bed.

Winter Eyes is a poetry book that's fun reading from cover to cover.

Winter: An Alphabet Acrostic
Written by Steven Schnur
Illustrated by Leslie Evans

This is the last in Schnur’s series of seasonal acrostic books. Both Schnur's poems and Evans' hand-colored linoleum block print illustrations evoke the chill of winter out of doors and the warmth and coziness of sitting by a fire or snuggling on a couch under a blanket indoors in winter. The book opens with a poem about the beginning of a new day:

At dawn, a thick
White frost covers the lawn
As the steaming
Kettle whistles
Everyone up.

Outside it’s C-O-L-D!

Crystals
Of ice as delicate as
Lace ring the
Duck pond.

The poems gives readers a good overview of the winter season.There are acrostics about deer in an orchard, a flurry of snowflakes, a father gathering kindling, hibernating animals, pine trees in moonlight, ice skating, and boiling vats of maple sap. The collection closes with a few poems about the end of winter and coming of spring.

You can view three of the interior illustrations from the book here.

Winter Poems

Selected by Barbara Rogasky

Illustrated by Trina Schart Hyman

You can read my 2007 review of Winter Poems here: POETRY FRIDAY: Winter in Poems & Paintings

Snow, Snow: Winter Poems for Children
Written by Jane Yolen
Photographs by Jason Stemple

Pictures of snow that her son Jason Stemple took in Colorado served as Yolen’s inspiration for the thirteen poems in this book. The collection begins with the poem What’s Left of Fall and a picture of fallen leaves covered with snow crystals. Here are the first six lines of the poem:

Crisp leaf litter
Under snowy glitter;

Crumpled and brown
Letters thrown down;

The last bit of shade
From autumn’s parade

Subjects of other poems in the book include a skiing, snow on the trees, a snowmobile, footprints in the snow, and a river wrapped in “ermine robes.”

Snow, Snow closes with A Cold Finger—the finger being the “mittenless” branch of a tree that is pointing the way toward spring.

Once Upon Ice and Other Frozen Poems
Selected by Jane Yolen
Photographs by Jason Stemple

For this anthology, Jane Yolen asked a number of poets “to look at Jason Stemple’s eerily wonderful photographs of ice formations and write whatever the photos inspired." Poets whose works you’ll find in this book include Kathi Appelt, X. J. Kennedy, Mary Ann Hoberman, Ann Turner, Lee Bennett Hopkins, J. Patrick Lewis, Nancy Willard, and Jane Yolen. The poems are written in a variety of styles. Some are filled with imagery; some are rhythmic and rhyming—like Mary Ann Hoberman’s poem Ice Cycle:

I’ve always thought it rather nice
That water freezes into ice.
I’m also pleased that it is true
That ice melts back to water too.
But even so I find it strange
The way that ice and water change
And how a single water drop
Can fathom when it’s time to stop
Its downward drip and go ahead
And start an icicle instead.

Jason Stemple's photographs are sure to send chills down readers' spines. The book is a lovely pairing of poetry and pictures.

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At Political Verses, I have a kind of anti-valentine poem titled Look at the Man: A Poem Explaining Why Women with Mates Gain Weight.

At Blue Rose Girls, I have a humorous poem by Ogden Nash titled Common Cold.

Lee Wind has the Poetry Friday Roundup at I’m Here. I’m Queer. What the Hell Do I Read?

Here & There and The 2010 Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award Winners

2010 Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award Winners Announced!
Thanks to Sylvia Vardell at Poetry for Children for information about the 2010 Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award winner and honor books:

Winner

Button Up! Wrinkled Rhymes
Written by Alice Schertle
Illustrated by Petra Mathers

Button Up! is a delightful collection of mask poems in which articles of clothing and footwear speak from their points of view.

Click here to read my review of Button Up!.

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Honor Books

A Curious Collection of Cats
Written by Betsy Franco
Illustrated by Michael Wertz
(Tricycle Press, 2009)

This is a cleverly illustrated book of visual poems about cats for children.

Click here to see Michael Wertz’s colorful illustrations (and Franco’s poems) from this book on flickr.

Crossing Stones
Written by Helen Frost
(Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2009)

The Tree That Time Built: A Celebration of Nature, Science, and Imagination
Selected by Mary Ann Hoberman and Linda Winston
(Sourcebooks, 2009)

This is an exceptional anthology that connects poetry and science. The book contains more than one hundred poems. It truly is a celebration of our world, of nature and imagination—and of Darwin’s Tree of Life.

Click here to read my review of The Tree That Time Built.

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Here & There

• From the Children’s Literature and Reading Special Interest Group of the International Reading Association: 2010 Notable Books for a Global Society—outstanding multicultural literature for Grades Pre-K-12.
  
• The 2009 Cuffies (Publishers Weekly, 1/25/2010)
  For their annual “Off the Cuff” awards, PW asked booksellers around the country for their picks in a variety of categories.
  Click here to see the winners of the Cuffies.
  
• From School Library Journal: Katherine the Great: There couldn't be a better choice for our new kids' book ambassador than Katherine Paterson (By Kathleen T. Horning, 2/1/2010)
  
• From School Library Journal: Sibling Arrivalry—Books about Birth and Adoption (By Henrietta Thornton-Verma, 2/1/2010)
  
• From Booklist: Top 10 Books on the Environment for Youth: 2010
  (By Gillian Engberg, February 15, 2010)