I've just read a kitchen implement poem by Ginger Bread,
so I know the idea of poetry nom de plumes and alter egos
has hit at least one home here at the middle school where
the library holds stuffed shelves of poetry books, and
good ones. Naomi Shihab Nye's collections - This Same Sky,
I Get a Little Jumpy Around You, and the Emily Dickinson
volume in the poetry for young people series. Culture
begets Culture. For two weeks, four poets are holding
workshops, one each in fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth grades;
the poetry tide is flowing, where kids' poems already
pulse with life on the pod walls. Culture and more culture.
The literacy coach says a local poet comes with a visual
artist, so there's interplay of word and image where
I may have mentioned culture begets culture, and kids
believe in words. And art. And possibility. It isn't fair.