Poetry that poetry-hating DS might like?

[Michelle T]

I've decided to read one short poem to DS each week. I've been using an ancient book from my own childhood, "Piping Down the Valleys Wild". My copy is so tattered and old, and full of highlighting on the poems I really enjoyed.

Anyway, DS is apparently not so thrilled with poetry as I was. He's 11.5, and full of the attitude only a boy that age could radiate. As far as he's concerned, poetry is dumb and boring.

Okay. So, recommendations for poetry a DS might actually enjoy? If it is funny or gross, so much the better.
Michelle T

[Beth in Central TX]

What about A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson? My boys like his poetry, and I usually pull from this book for additional selections to assign as copywork and/or memorization.

[mooooom]

These are not serious poems but he would probably enjoy at least some of them.

[Alice]

Poetry Speaks to Children is a great anthology that comes with a CD for listening (the poems are read by the poets). They aren't all great poems but it might be a good place to start or to see which poets he likes.

Another idea would be Ogden Nash. I haven't read a lot of his poems but my son likes Custard the Dragon (there is a nice version illustrated by Lynne Munsinger). It would be young for your son but maybe a fun intro.

[dragons in the flower bed]

Okay. So, recommendations for poetry a DS might actually enjoy? If it is funny or gross, so much the better.


Hilaire Belloc, AA Milne, Ogden Nash and Shel Silverstein all come immediately to mind. You might also try looking at slam poetry. This book and DVD (http://www.amazon.com/Hewitts-Guide-Slam-Poetry-DVD/dp/1931492093) is a good introductory course in doing slam; this is my favorite anthology of slam poems (http://www.amazon.com/Spoken-Word-Revolution-PB-Audio/dp/1402202466) but you might want to censor some; and if you want to go youtubing you'll find a lot. I recommend searching for Taylor Mali (http://youtube.com/watch?v=RxsOVK4syxU) for a clean slam poet to start with.

[ELaurie]

Treasury of Children's Poetry (http://www.amazon.com/Hutchinsons-Treasury-Childrens-Poetry-Alison/dp/0091767482/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1205264808&sr=1-1)

The Oxford Illustrated book of Children's poems (http://www.amazon.com/Oxford-Illustrated-American-Childrens-Poems/dp/019514578X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1205264865&sr=1-1)

both contain lots of silly (and some serious) poetry.

If I can get them laughing, they forget that they are memorizing poetry :)

[attachedto4]

ANother vote for Shel Silverstein.

[Sunkirst]

My family really likes The Random House Book of Poetry for Children. The poems are selected by Jack Prelutsky, the illustrations by Arnold Lobel. It has a section titled Where Goblins Dwell, concerning all things scary and spooky, and my 10 yob has memorized a good deal of them (in fact, I just borrowed the book from his desk so I could get the name right).
Another suggestion would be to try Tuesday Tea Time as suggested in Julie Boggart's website about The Bravewriter Lifestyle:

Tea Time (http://www.bravewriter.com/BWL/bwlteatime.html)

My kids look forward to this, and remind me if I miss it. I think that when I read the poetry aloud, it makes much more of an impression on them.

[Zee]

You have received some good suggestions here. I would like to ditto the recommendations for "A Child's Garden of Verses." and "Poetry speaks to Children." Those are great to start with. Check out the children's poetry section of your library and get some books that have good illustrations to draw your son in. Buy the books that have the most appeal. Sonlight has poetry recommendations for each year. Those have been good suggestions for us, also.

Two additional suggestions I would make:
1. Consider reading poetry every day. Just read one poem or one page....everyday. This approach has worked well with my son and over time, he has come to look forward to this very brief moment in our day. It only takes 30 seconds to 2 min. most days, so it isn't complicated to add in. I ask my son what he thought of the poem, what he liked/disliked, and what he thought it was about. He has gotten better at picking out the theme of the poem. Some days he doesn't have a clue, so I tell him what I think. Sometimes, I don't get it, or don't like it either and I tell him why. Less than 5 min. total. I don't treat this as indepth poetry study, just light exposure for the sake of enjoyment.

2. Have him memorize poetry if you aren't already doing so. Pick out fun "boy-type" poems or let him choose one that he would like to memorize. Even if they aren't great poems at first, just get him memorizing and interested! My 5th grader is currently memorizing "The Spider and the Fly" and he enjoys changing voices for each part. It's a "dark" poem with a great message, so it's very boy friendly. Start with small poems and build up.

HTH.

[ELaurie]

Great suggestions!

[mcconnellboys]

Silverstein, sure! And what about Pretelusky, too????? Great boybarian poetry!

Regena

[Heather in VA]

ANother vote for Shel Silverstein.

I third Shel Silverstein. If you can't get him to laugh at "Sick" then it's probably a lost cause.

[Rosie_0801]

If you don't mind something from my side of the world, I can suggest Henry Lawson's work. Mum bought me an abridged version when I was your son's age. Most of it is pioneer Australia type stuff. I remember the poems about "Andy" to be quite manly.
:)
Rosie

[Laura Corin]

There are some pretty martial poems he might like. How about The Destruction of Sennacherib, by Byron, or The Charge of the Light Brigade by Tennyson? Calvin also enjoyed The Tyger, by Blake.

Laura

[Lori D.]

My boys don't care for poetry a bit -- and dear hubby is a poet in his spare time! Here are some poems/poets/books that actually went over well here with the non-poetry boys (and NO, we haven't read all of this! -- yet! (lol):


- Lewis Carroll
Carroll's parody of famous poems of his day (such as "How Doth the Crocodile"), found scattered throughout "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland", and "Through the Looking Glass". And, of course, Carroll's 2 most famous poems: "The Walrus and the Carpenter" and "Jabberwocky".

- Edward Lear
Wrote a lot of nonsensical poems, such as "The Owl and the Pussycat".

- Ogden Nash
Fun, usually short poems. Example: "Common Sense": Why did the Lord give us agility,/If not to evade responsibility?

- Shel Silverstein
Very accessible poetry.


Strongly Narrative Poems (sometimes poems that really tell a story are easier to connect with):
- "Casey At The Bat" (Thayer)
- "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere" (Longfellow)
- "Charge of the Light Brigade" (Tennyson)
(Memorial poem of the suicidal charge by light cavalry over open terrain by British forces in the Battle of Balaclava (Ukraine) in the Crimean War (1854-56). 247 men of the 637 in the charge were killed or wounded.)
- "Hiawatha" (Longfellow) -- very long (novella length)
- "Evangeline" (Longfellow) -- very long (novella length)
- "The Goblin Market" (Rossetti)
- "Old Ironsides" (Holmes) -- the poem that led to saving the USS Constitution ("Old Ironsides"), the famous 1812 U.S. warship
- "Kubla Khan"(Coleridge)
- "Ibu Ben Adhem" (Hunt)
- "The Raven" (Poe) -- long; not so narrative, but a great, spooky atmosphere


Children's Picture Books of Poetry
(Don't immediately dismiss these -- they can be a fun and gentle way into beginning to learn how to listen to and appreciate poetry.)
- When It Snowed That Night (Norma Farber) -- lovely short poems on the animals coming to visit baby Jesus
- Antarctica Antics (Judy Sierra) -- well written, short, fun poems all about penguins
- Science Verse (Scieszka) -- parodies of famous poems and songs, now all about science
- A Poke in the I: A Collection of Concrete Poems (Janeczko) -- 30 poems that are also homonym and visual games
- The Disappearing Alphabet (Wilber)
- Alphabestiary: Animal Poems from A to Z (Yolen) -- collection of animal poems by famous and talented poets


Books:
- "Poetry Speaks to Children" -- editor: Elise Paschen (wonderful, accessible collection of poems, many by former U.S. poet laureates!)
- "Opposites" -- Richard Wilbur (*very* clever and fun short poem/riddles)
- "More Opposites" -- Richard Wilbur (sequel to above)
- check out some of the poetry collection books used by Sonlight Curriculum


Poems Emailed to You:
- Library of Congress: Poetry 180: A Poem A Day for American High Schools
http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/


What about the book of Psalms?
Lovely Hebrew praise/worship poems -- and some with a lot of forceful emotion (lol), as in the psalms by David before he was king being chased around by various enemies? The psalms focus on rhythm and imagery rather than the rhyming patterns we are accustomed to in Western culture poetry.


What Your ... Grader Should Know
There are some very nice, wide-ranging selections of poems in each of these volumes (at least, in the volumes for grades 2 - 6, which is what I have). The poem is reprinted, along with a little info about the poet, and then there are more poetry suggestions at the end of the section.


Finally, I have the 10 volume set "The Junior Classics: The Young Folks' Shelf of Books", published by Collier, (edited by Mabel Williams and Marcia Dalphin). The whole series is fabulous, with a lot of myths, fairy tales, and selections from classic literature that works *very* well with WTM history. Anyways, volume 10 is over 300 pages of all classic poems, listed by topic, especially selected for young people, and includes all the well-known western (European and American) poets such as:

Oliver Wendall Holmes, Edgar Allan Poe, James Lowell, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Ralph Waldo Emerson, William Cullen Bryant, Christiana Rossetti, Robert Browning, Lord Alfred Tennyson, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Sir Walter Scott, William Wordsworth, William Blake, Alexander Pope, John Bunyan, John Milton, William Shakespeare, Robert Louis Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Walt Whitman, Robert Burns, Hilaire Belloc, Robert Frost, and lots more!

See it at:
http://www.amazon.com/Young-Folks-Shelf-Books-Colliers/dp/B000CQYBVG

Some of these volumes might be available at ebay (though, there is also a different Junior Classic available, too, so use the photo at the amazon website as a guide).


Whew! Hope something there connects and gets you started on reading some poetry! April is National Poetry month, so you've got great timing in getting started with "a poem a day"! BEST of luck! Warmly, Lori D.

[King Alfred Academy]

My family really likes The Random House Book of Poetry for Children. The poems are selected by Jack Prelutsky, the illustrations by Arnold Lobel. It has a section titled Where Goblins Dwell, concerning all things scary and spooky, and my 10 yob has memorized a good deal of them (in fact, I just borrowed the book from his desk so I could get the name right).
Another suggestion would be to try Tuesday Tea Time as suggested in Julie Boggart's website about The Bravewriter Lifestyle:

Tea Time (http://www.bravewriter.com/BWL/bwlteatime.html)

My kids look forward to this, and remind me if I miss it. I think that when I read the poetry aloud, it makes much more of an impression on them.

I second the The Random House Book of Poetry for Children.
We also do "tea time"...in fact, just started it this week! They like taking "break" from their studies to have a fancy or not-so-fancy snack and listen to me read. We rotate it between our nature stories, poetry, and picture studies.

[Eliana]

Poetry that poetry-hating DS might like?

What books does he like to read?
How does he approach the world in general?
Does he like word play? Natural beauty?

If this is his first exposure to poetry it might take some time to help him appreciate it, but it is never too late!

Younger kids tend to prefer predictable rhyme and meter (well, not all kids and not all the time, but in general!), but older kids often need to connect mentally as well. (Whether seriously or humorously.)

So, for a younger child 'Once I caught a Little Rhyme" or "Eletelephony" or I Like it When It's Mizzly (which are in your anthology) are pure delight, but they aren't as likely to catch the fancy of an older kid new to poetry.

An analytical kid might like to look at what poetry does that prose can't - the first chapter of Perrine's Sound and Sense might give you some inspiration for discussing this. Sometimes taking a really short poem and talking about what it says that a more literal/factual prose piece of comparable length couldn't can help a child see the magic of poetry.

What is being said about fog here:

Fog

Sandburg
or an eagle (the first example in Sound & Sense, I think:

The Eagle
Tennyson

or faith here:

[I never saw a moor]

Dickinson

What kinds of blindness does each stanza refer to:

All But Blind

de la Mare

An analytical kid might be drawn in by the puzzle aspect of rhyme and meter and meaning (Beum & Shapiro's Prosdy Handbook & Fussell's Poetic Meter and Poetic Form are fabulous resources for this. Mary Oliver's very accessible books A Poetry Handbook and Rules for the Dance deal with fewer complexities, but they break out the components more clearly for a newbie, I think.)


Comparing lines or stanzas w/ different meters can be fascinating:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (pentameter - normal)
Whose woods these are I think I know (tetrameter - sparser, faster, sometimes more agitated)
Could make a small boy dizzy (trimeter - fast, often a sense of gaiety or agitation)
For o'er the southern moors I have a home for thee (hexameter/alexandrine - can show a sense of abundance, grandiosity, richness, joy)

Seeing how patterns of lines of different lengths and different stresses within lines of the same length alter the whole feeling of the line can be an entrancing exercise.

Some kids like poems that connect with the natural world:

Wordsworth, lots of Wordsworth!

February Twilight

Sara Teasdale

I stood beside a hill

Smooth with new-laid snow,

A single star looked out

From the cold evening glow.

There was no other creature

That saw what I could see—

I stood and watched the evening star

As long as it watched me.



But What Was Beauty?

Elizabeth Coatsworth

Something Told the Wild Geese

Rachel Field

Something told the wild geese

It was time to go.

Though the fields lay golden

Something whispered,—“Snow.”

Leaves were green and stirring,

Berries, luster-glossed,

But beneath warm feathers

Something cautioned,—“Frost.”

All the sagging orchards

Steamed with amber spice,

But each wild breast stiffened

At remembered ice.

Something told the wild geese,

It was time to fly,—

Summer sun was on their wings,

Winter in their cry.



[I'll tell you how the sun rose]

Emily Dickinson


Or, at your son's age as they begin to grapple with some of the bigger ideas about what it is to be human:

Sonnet XCIV: They that have power to hurt and will do none

Shakespeare



On His Blindness

Milton

[When I have fears that I may cease to be]

Keats

Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold
I Measure Every Grief I Meet - Dickinson
The Panther - Rilke
Music I Heard With You - Aiken

This Russian Soil - Akhmatova


In lockets for a charm we do not wear it,
In verse about its sorrows do not weep,
With Eden's blissful vales do not compare it,
Untroubled does it leave our bitter sleep.

To traffic in it is a thought that never,
Not even in our hearts, remote, takes root.
Before our eyes its image does not hover,
Though we be beggared, sick, despairing, mute.

It's the mud on our shoes, it is rubble,
It's the sand on our teeth, it is slush,
It's the pure, taintless dust that we crumble,
That we pound, that we mix, that we crush.
But it's ours, our own, and will open one day
To receive and embrace us and turn us to clay.



My son has always loved poems which tell or hint at stories:

Sir Walter Scott's Lochinvar (he loved this so much he went one to read and try to memorize Marmion - over 200 pages in the file I have saved, he never did finish!)

Yeats: Wild Swans Coole

TS Eliot's cat poems, especially Macavity

Sir Patrick Spens and other medieval ballads
Schiller's The Glove

Tennyson's lady of Shallot
Poe's Raven of Annabelle Lee
Vet; Lead; Outside by Eleanor Farjeon (especially good for dog lovers)

On A Night of Snow - Coatsworth


Cat, if you go outdoors, you must walk in the snow.

You will come back with little white shoes on your feet,

little white shoes of snow that have heels of sleet.

Stay by the fire, my Cat. Lie still, do not go.

See how the flames are leaping and hissing low,

I will bring you a saucer of milk like a marguerite,

so white and so smooth, so spherical and so sweet -

stay with me, Cat. Outdoors the wild winds blow.

Outdoors the wild winds blow, Mistress, and dark is the night,

strange voices cry in the trees, intoning strange lore,

and more than cats move, lit by our eyes green light,

on silent feet where the meadow grasses hang hoar -

Mistress, there are portents abroad of magic and might,

and things that are yet to be done. Open the door!


Chaucer's Complaint to His Purse

Ozymandias

Percy Bysse Shelley




Barter


Life has loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things,
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fire that sways and sings,
And children's faces looking up
Holding wonder like a cup.
Life has loveliness to sell,
Music like a curve of gold,
Scent of pine trees in the rain,
Eyes that love you, arms that hold,
And for your spirit's still delight,
Holy thoughts that star the night.
Spend all you have for loveliness,
But it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost,
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.





Did I Miss Anything

Tom Wayman

http://www.library.utoronto.ca/canpoetry/wayman/poem5.htm


I am out of space, but I guess the short version is - there are so many different approaches to poetry and kinds of poems and topics for poems out there, and with patience, perseverance, and a lot of reference books, you should be able to help your son discover the wonders of poetry.

(I'd intended to share a bunch of non-Western poetry, sometimes a completely different flavor can be more appealing... if you think that might appeal to him, and you want some suggestions, let me know!)

Grr.. I had to cut the text of many of the poems - let me know if you have trouble finding them - they should all be easily findable online, but I can email copies of any of them to anyone who wants/needs.


You've gotten a lot of great suggestions, and I've tried not to duplicate what others are saying - but I do second them!

[Laurie]

I bought the 25th anniversary edition of Where the Sidewalk Ends. Maybe you and your ds would have fun listening to the poet himself!

[tess in the burbs]

the Michael Clay Thompson language arts series has a poetry book.

Music of the Hemispheres
http://rfwp.com/series36.htm#105

I am putting this on my 'future' list. My son and I read some of it together this weekend and he really enjoyed it. (he's 6)