Friday, November 7, 2008

Poetry Friday: An Autumn List Poem

Two years ago, I was practicing writing list poems. Here’s one of my mediocre efforts. I have hundreds of poems like Autumn--poems that I’ll probably never see published anywhere but my blog. Still, I find that working on such pieces is like doing poetry calisthenics. It helps pump up my writing muscles. There are times, however, when I revisit old poems like Autumn and find a kernel of something I like in them that I can rework into a different and a better poem.


AUTUMN
by Elaine Magliaro


Crickets sighing
Birds goodbying
Pumpkins growing plump and round

Apple picking
Football kicking
Chestnuts thudding on the ground

Bright leaves falling
Wild geese calling
Honeybees huddling in their hive

Trick-or-treating
Turkey eating
Winter’s waiting to arrive



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At Blue Rose Girls, I have a Poetry Friday post with two poems by Sherman Alexie in honor of Native American Heritage Month.


Jone has the Poetry Friday Roundup at Check It Out.

11 comments:

Linda said...

Great poem as always, Elaine. I especially like the first two stanzas, wonderful imagery!

Elaine Magliaro said...

Thanks, Linda. I've been so busy in recent days, I haven't had much time to spend on blogging. Last night, I dug through my old poems hoping to find something I could post for Poetry Friday.

jama said...

This is lovely. I especially like the "birds goodbying." :)

Elaine Magliaro said...

Thanks, Jama. Autumn is my favorite season. Lots of the trees here still have their leaves--and the temperatures have been really mild.

Douglas Florian said...

you forgot:

pigeons homing
Poets poming

great poem, Elaine

douglas florian

Elaine Magliaro said...

Thank you, Douglas! Glad you stopped by. I guess I should get back to work and do some more poming.

Mary Lee said...

Thanks for sharing your poming with us!

Elaine Magliaro said...

Mary Lee,

I was so wrapped up with the presidential campaign, watching the news, and reading political blogs in recent weeks that I really haven't done much poming. I guess it's time I went looking for my muse again.

laurasalas said...

That's better than mediocre, Elaine! And how funny that Douglas Florian stopped by, because I was going to say this had the feel of a Florian poem to me!

laurasalas said...

P.S. Forgot to say that the first stanza's my favorite. And that I completely agree...all our poems that never get published ARE calisthenics (fun ones). And we do sometimes find the kernel of something fabulous in those exercises. I love it when that happens.

Elaine Magliaro said...

Laura,

Thanks. I really haven't done much writing of children's poems lately--only political verse. I guess now that the election is in the past I can get back to working on one of my manuscripts that I put aside for way too long.