Tag: seasons

Poetry Friday: Summer Triptych

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Summer Triptych – For the Teachers

I.

Freedom is the classroom door closed and locked.
Shelves are covered with craft paper,
desk drawers are perhaps organized
or else abandoned in clutter.
It can all
wait.

II.

A black swallowtail dips
to the dill
time shifts
from calendar and clock
to caterpillar and bloom.

III.

Chicory appears
along roadsides and railroads:
blue brackets 
that begin and end
this season of necessary
loosening.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2026

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The Poetry Sisters’ challenge for this month was to use Louise Ireland’s august triptych as our mentor poem. I studied her flow carefully. In her part one, she captured a feeling on the brink of summer’s end. In her part two, she had a concrete example from nature. And in her part three, she had another concrete example and her big lesson. I borrowed Ireland’s lead, “Freedom is…” but I wrote for all teachers, remembering well that feeling of walking away from the months of structured routines with no time for myself and into the breathing room of summer.

Next month we’ll be writing Pádraig Ó Tuama-inspired pantoums. He regularly offers a pantoum challenge on his Substack, with different prompts for each of the lines. We’re using this prompt, from January. Lots of you have written Pádraig Pantoums. We hope you’ll join us for another on the last Friday of July.

Tricia has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup @ The Miss Rumphius Effect 
Two other Poetry Sisters are with us this week:
Liz @ Liz Garton Scanlon
Tanita @ {fiction, instead of lies}

Poetry Friday: MAY!

Happy May Day! Today is an Inklings challenge day, and Heidi challenged us to “Celebrate May by writing a poem that Maykes use of the verbs may, might, could, can, ought.” It felt SO good to use more words, syllables, and lines!

Here’s how the rest of the Inklings met this month’s challenge:

Catherine @Reading to the Core
Heidi @my juicy little universe
Margaret @Reflections on the Teche
Molly @Nix the Comfort Zone
Linda @A Word Edgewise

Rose has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at Imagine the Possibilities.

The image is via Unsplash.

Poetry Friday: Who’s Ready For Winter?

On a Flake-Flying Day: Watching Winter’s Wonders
by Buffy Silverman
Millbrook Press/Lerner Books, coming October 3, 2023
review copy compliments of the publisher

In 2020, Buffy Silverman took readers “puddle-sploshing” in On A Snow-Melting Day: Seeking Signs of Spring. Vivid photographs and a snappy rhyming text earned this book recognition as an NCTE Notable Poetry Book for 2021.

Then last fall, we wandered through forests and meadows, pausing at ponds to witness animals and plants in On a Gold-Blooming Day: Finding Fall Treasures, a 2023 CLA/NCTE Notable Children’s Books in the Language Arts, and a Children’s Book Committee at Bank Street College of Education Best Children’s Books of the Year for 2023.

Lucky us! This year readers get to experience “winter’s wonders” with more gorgeous photos, and Buffy’s evocative rhymes in On a Flake-Flying Day: Watching Winter’s Wonders.

I missed getting to share “Snow-Melting” with students in 2020, but every one of my after-school kiddos loved “Gold-Blooming” last fall. I can’t wait to share “Flake-Flying” in a few months! Reading these books with small groups gathered close allows for time to study and talk about the photographs, to track the rhymes, and, when a question comes up, verify facts or vocabulary with the informational back matter and/or glossary. In a regular classroom setting, teachers could create a seasonal text set for each book using the titles listed for “Further Reading.” And in writing workshop, the books would make fantastic mentor texts for studying creative ways to hyphenate words as well as ways to craft leads and endings.

My favorite rhymes in ON A FLAKE-FLYING DAY are the ones that start the book off: “On a feather-fluffing, seed-stuffing, cloud-puffing day…” My favorite photo is the frosty-topped cedar waxwing practically posing with a berry in its beak:

And my favorite fact is that dragonfly nymphs prowl for minnows and other aquatic insects below the frozen surfaces of winter waters. (Dragonflies are amazing in all the stages of their lives!)

I asked Buffy to tell us a little bit about her process. I wondered if the photos came first, or the words. Here’s what she had to say:

Although I enjoy taking photographs, I’m really not a visual thinker. The words always come first for me–and then I hope that there will be a way to illustrate them! With this book I followed the pattern from ON A SNOW-MELTING DAY and ON A GOLD-BLOOMING DAY. In each of the books there are four sets of refrains (On a feather-fluffing, seed-stuffing, cloud-puffing day…) followed by three pairs of rhyming sentences (Weasel whitens. Cardinal brightens…) In each of the books I included sights and sounds from a field, a wetland, and a forest, and ended with a child outside, enjoying the season. Basically the books are the nature walks I would want to take with a child or other reader!

Lots of us in the Northern Hemisphere are looking forward to winter’s relief from this summer’s heat. Pre-order ON A FLAKE-FLYING DAY now so that come October 3, you will be guaranteed snow, ice, and frost…if only between the pages of Buffy’s newest (fantastic-as-the-other-two) book! Thank you, Buffy, for giving me this opportunity to help you spread the word, and thank you, Millbrook Press, for the review copy!

Amy has this week’s Poetry Friday roundup at The Poem Farm.

Those of you who were curious about what I had in mind for my poem last week, it was a combination of literal (a traffic jam of cars) but also metaphorical (life changes following retirement). I had loads of fun hearing what pictures the poem made in your minds and I’m SO glad I chose not to add an image!