Collage Poems

The end of the school year approaches. Mutiny is brewing among the poetry crew, and for the past few weeks I've heard countless versions of the following complaint: "Miss Sarah, we write all day at school! Why do we need to write more?" It was a question I didn't have an answer for. I always try to make class fun, but these kids were clearly exhausted by the endless work and craving something more light-hearted. So I've come up with a few new poetry games and art-writing fusions to move beyond the typical "read, discuss, write" model. This class on poetry collages was the first attempt.

I passed out ten-page packets of famous and not-so-famous poems for them to skim through. Using this raw material, they cut and pasted words, phrases, lines, and whole stanzas to create a new poem, mixing different voices in surprising new ways. Many were especially drawn to "As I Grew Older" by Langston Hughes, mixing up the lines and weaving in just a few images from elsewhere.

This week, the girls were unusually quiet and focused as they worked, and I even had time to make a collage of my own. It was a nice change to work alongside them instead of constantly circling around the room. Collages from class:

Effervescence gush It was a long time ago
I have almost forgotten my dream
And now the crickets play But it was there then
In front of me
-Saruro

some say the world will end in fire
it was a long time ago when the world exploded
that was cool
-Safia

I have almost forgotten my dream.
It was a long time ago,
a thousand lights of sun.
Only the thick wall,
Only the shadow.
My hands!
My dark hands!
Help me to shatter this darkness,
to smash this night,
to break this shadow.
And we soar up into the summer stars.
Summer. The big sky river rushes overhead.
-Dahiro


Help me to shatter this darkness
old and grey and full of sleep
bearing asteroids and mist, blind fish
old space suits with skeletons inside

I have almost forgotten my dream:
two rivers burning bright - one sap and one root -
cracked hands - half-eaten moon - thousand lights of sun

I lie down in the shadow, press an ear against its hive
-"Miss Sarah"

Remember

I read the girls "Remember" by Joy Harjo, and a response written by a fourth-grade boy. After talking about favorite lines and the use of repetition in the poem, I asked them to write their own, repeating the word "remember" at the beginning of each line. What did they want their readers to remember about the world? What joy or pain did they want to share with others?

Remember when the stars were
playing with the moon and having fun.
Remember why the sky and the bird
were fighting and then became friends again.
Remember when the cars were trying to go
to the sky and fly in the sky and trying to put
their shoes up in the sky.
-Adout

Remember when dinosaurs were
alive. Remember when my brother
ruined my cake. Remember
when the stars helped you.
Remember when I was laughing
so hard that I even died.
-Safia

To Anna
Remember when you were playing outside?
Remember when you were happy in the sun?
Remember when boys weren't jerks and didn't lie?
Remember when we were laughing and you weren't sad?
-Melisa

Translations

Only two girls in class this time, so we headed outside to write. I had brought in a few poems written in foreign languages for them to "translate" into English based on how the words looked and sounded. They found the whole poems to be a little overwhelming, so they instead made a long list of English words "translated" from the poem and then used those words in an original poem:

When I say the word misoka
the color pink comes out of my eyes.
The word misoka sounds like enjoying
a day in the sunshine. Misoka is wine
like Safia said that her paper is flying away.
Misoka is like laughing. Safia's beautiful
laugh makes the beautiful sun come out. I love when
Safia laughs. Misoka is riding a bike
on a nice day with my friends and running.
-Adout

The lemon is eating the fox.
The lemon is huge and the fox
is just a tiny baby. In Colombia,
people use aprons to catch food
like a fishing net. The sea is transporting
camels from desert to desert. Cinnamon
makes me remember campers fighting
for justice. Safia owns the camp. Safia
is not how she usually is. She is going
crazy all over the place, and her friend
Adout is trying to calm her down.
Safia likes to compose herself and she
likes the lemons. Giant lemons,
because they are her friends.
-Safia

After they were finished, they chose to write a few color poems like the ones they've been writing in school:

What is red?
Red is a fire truck siren, red is a hydrant.
Red is a hummingbird feeder, an electric guitar.
Red is Safia's scarf shining and helping the sun shine too.
When you cut yourself, red is your blood. Red is
a valentine's heart to give to someone you love.
Red is a cherry, an apple, an Indian fig.
Red. You can taste it as you bite it.
-Safia

Flowers are blue, blue is candy, blue is a bike,
blue is a sled. Blue is in love with the color pink.
Blue is a star, a lake, a car driving everywhere.
Blue is a friend that loves to make friends.
Blue said that she is a girl and she likes my teacher.
-Adout

Safia then wrote a longer piece about her scarf. It's nice to improvise with a smaller group!

My red scarf shines bright and helps the sun shine too. When I wear it the sun shines, and when I don't the sky is dark. My grandma bought it in a marketplace in Kenya and forgot to give it to me before I left Africa. When she came to America, she left it in Rochester, NY, so there was still no way for me to get the scarf. So one day I went to Rochester and my grandma gave me the red scarf and a yellow one, bright and sparkly. Together they looked orange, just like my dress. It reminds me of my grandma when I wear it, sitting lonely with her children all gone.
-Safia

Creation Myths

For this lesson, I read the girls a few stories from Marduk the Mighty, a great book of international creation stories by Andrew Matthews. I asked them a few questions: What was here before the universe? How did this world come to be? What about plants, animals, and people? They answered these questions in their own creation myths using dreams, things they'd heard in school or church, and things they just made up:

In Africa the world was dark and there was nothing, not even shoes. There were no cities or cars or people. Then out of the darkness, a voice came saying, "Wake up!" And the deserts woke up and the jungles woke up and the water woke up.
-Asho

In the beginning there were plants and trees. There was a sky filled with clouds, moon, and sun. The sun was making the plants grow and turn the world into a desert. The moon was making darkness. The plants grew to be a cactus. The sun also made trees grow so they could grow fruit for the apes to eat. Later in the year the apes learned everything that humans know so they became human. The darkness made rain, which made a river. The humans dug a big circle and turned it into an ocean. There were fishes, dolphins, whales, octopus, and jellyfish living in the ocean. Then one of these animals in the ocean created a bunch of shells so they'd have a house. Also there were birds and the birds came from nature. There were cats, dogs, horses, cows, skunks, raccoons, and squirrels. God created them.
-Melisa and Safia

In the beginning there was the sun and the sun grew and made a tree. Aliens were coming. They lived in the world and left and then the animals came. And the rain started raining and made oceans and rivers and sharks. Animals started going into the rivers. Apes started being people and people came from apes.
-Adout

Ekphrastic Poems

Sorry for my long absence! I've taught four classes since my last post, but I've really lagged behind in posting to this blog. I'll do a whirlwind update today, then get back into the regular rhythm of one post per week.

For this lesson, I brought in several full-color art books from the library and had each student choose a painting or other artwork they'd like to write about. They were encouraged to write from inside the picture and use all their senses to explore what was happening. Here are some results:

I am green and red
with flowers. Please
wear me because
I am pretty. We'll go
to a dance party
and we will sway
like the ocean
to guitars and drums
under the stars.
-Abshiro, after "Self Portrait" by Carmen Lomas Garza

She is a famous person and
she is outside. Oil painting.
Her eyes follow you
everywhere. She looks happy.
People were sad when she died.

The background of the village looks
like war. The color is gold-black.
Tornado coming from far away.
People being poor.
-Safia, after "Mona Lisa" by Leonardo da Vinci

If I was resting in this flower it would be like resting on a cloud with the sun shining on my face and smells like perfume and pink cherry. The stamen looks like a green banana peel. The inside of the flower is like a dark cave with sounds like paper. I have never seen a flower like this one before.
-Khadijo, after "Two Calla Lilies on Pink" by Georgia O'Keefe

He looks like a worm. He looks like a rainbow. He's pretty and nice. He looks curly. He's the longest snake ever. He's playing! He's on the ground in the city. He's powerful and if someone steps on him he'll probably still be alive. He eats cookies. He has a bunch of friends. He has a girlfriend named Francine, the most beautiful snake you've ever seen. He likes to swim in the water.
-Adout, after "Sneaky Snake" by Calvert Norton