Crafting our Poems

The chapter we are reading now in Poetry Matters is about having students craft their poems, and it starts with this quote--

"The world is full of poets with languid wrenches who don’t bother to take the last six turns on their bolts."  —X.J. Kennedy

I am a writer who struggles with these last six turns.  I write a first draft and always think that I am done.  That is why this chapter is brilliant.  It really gives some simple strategies to help our students work on making their poems even better after the first drafts.  

The first piece of advice that Ralph Fletcher gave in the chapter was to try using fragments.  After we read this section of the book I shared the poem Subways are People by Lee Bennett Hopkins.  

Subways are people-

People standing

People sitting

People swaying to and fro

Some in suits

Some in tatters

People I will never know.

Subways are people-

Some with glasses

Some without

Boy with smile

Girl with Frown

People dashing

Steel flashing

Up and down and round the town.

Subways are people-

People old

People new

People always on the go

Racing, running, rushing people

People I will never know. 

Then the class had some free writing time to try and use fragments in their poems. I thought the class did an amazing job of creating poems using fragments. Here are just some of the amazing examples:

Buses--

Kids yelling
Kids screaming

Kids out
Kids in

Kids bouncing
Kids jumping

Kids going here 

and going there

This was just a little of the poem.  I love how this student captured the energy (that is a nice word) of the bus.  

New York

Dark night

light buildings

cars driving, drifting on 

the go

different colors

even some I do not know

Tall buildings

small houses

twisty turn roads

horns honking

people yelling

Cars driving, drifting 

on the go

I loved this bit of writing about New York.  I also love the confidence this author shows by repeating a line from their poem at the end.

Reds

Reds, Red

ball flying

ball zipping

bat swinging

people cheering

innings ending 

home runs happening

Run Reds go!

There is more to this poem that makes the ball park come alive.  

When the students were done creating this new writing, they went back to pieces of writing in their Writer's Notebooks and looked for places where they could try to add fragments.  This allows the students to practice those, "last six turns on their bolt" that Kennedy talked about in his quote.  

Tomorrow I hope to show you some more of the work the students are working on to make their poems even better.  I also promise to catch you up on some of the things we are doing in reading and social studies.

I hope you are all having a great week.