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Sally Murphy, Australian author

What Sheryl Gwyther Likes About Children’s Poetry

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I hope you are enjoying learning what my friends like best about children’s poetry. If you’ve just arrived here, throughout March I’ve been celebrating the release of my new verse novel, Toppling. As part of those celebrations I’ve invited my friends to drop in and share what it is they like about children’s poetry. The range of responses has been wonderful.

Today, I am delighted to welcome Sheryl Gwyther, children’s author and passionate book industry and literacy supporter, who has come to tell us what she likes about children’s poetry. Over to you, Sheryl.

What I like best of all about poetry is how the poet is able to capture so much in a few words – of how images are distilled and poured into those words. That is clever writing!


I haven’t read as many poetry or verse novels for younger children as I have books, but I aim to change that soon especially with the debut of Sally’s Toppling and her hugely popular, Pearl Verses the World.


Thankfully, my eyes were opened to the joys of verse novels for older children when I read Steven Herrick’s verse novel, Cold Skin. It was one of those books you cannot put down until it’s finished – and one in which the story and the characters stay in your mind for a very long time. I consumed Herrick’s Lonesome Howl and By the River in the same week – stories that wrung me out emotionally, but left a feeling of peace in my heart, and so glad I read them.
When I was at school, we studied Australian poetry and learned to say many poems off by heart. The ones that stayed with me created such strong images in my mind, I’m not surprised they have been perennial favourites for many Australians even in modern times.

Like Dorothea Mackellar’s My Country. Her words could never mean any other country except Australia. I like the way her poem accepts all the adversity, the harshness and beauty of this country, but it makes no difference, she loves it unreservedly.
I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains…..

Kenneth Slessor’s Beach Burial, written during WW2 is so evocative, so sad and beautiful. (It’s worth reading the whole piece.)

Softly and humbly to the Gulf of Arabs
The convoys of dead sailors come;
At night they sway and wander in the waters far under,
But morning rolls them in the foam.

Between the sob and clubbing of the gunfire
Someone, it seems, has time for this,
To pluck them from the shallows and bury them in burrows
And tread the sand upon their nakedness;…..


It makes me happy to see how children’s poetry books and verse novels are once more popular with publishers. It means that librarians and teachers encourage children to read poetry and to perform it. And that children will discover worlds they may remember forever, with emotions that will touch their hearts.

A loved poem is a friend you can take anywhere.
Thanks for dropping by Sheryl. I love the image of a poem as a friend!

What Helen Ross likes about Children’s Poetry.

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The month of March is marching by more quickly that I care to believe, but the great thing about that progression is that it brings yet another visitor to my blog to talk about their love of children’s poetry. If you’re new around here, in honour of the release of my new verse novel, Toppling, I have invited my friends to drop by during March and guest blog. Today’s guest is Helen Ross, here to tell us what it is that she likes about children’s poetry. Over to you, Helen.

Congratulations Sally on the release of Toppling. I wish you every success.


Poetry has always captivated me – in particular, children’s poems. This could be because I was a primary and kindergarten teacher many moons ago, and my love for it has remained.
I also remember the first poem I ever wrote.

‘Mr Whippy
One, two, three
Mr Whippy
You’re not he.”

I was about nine or ten years old when I made this ditty up at home one weekend as part of a tag game I was playing with my sister, and a friend. You can image my utter disappointment when I turned up to school next day to find the exact verse being recited for tag games.


When it comes to children’s poetry I sometimes feel like Alice in Wonderland. Once I enter the rabbit hole of wonderful children’s poems I am literally thrown into a myriad of other worlds. These worlds can be explored through a variety of forms – lullabies, nursery rhymes, haiku, daimante, cinquain, rhyming, non-rhyming, metrical, free verse, bush ballads, raps, limericks, sound poems, verse novels, to name just a few.

Children’s poetry (like any poetic forms) can take you on a journey (short or long), pull at your heart strings, be pure fun and nonsensical, a mode of teaching through metaphors and similes, used for language development, or be a means of creating artistic pictures.

SOLITUDE
I have a house where I go
When there’s too many people,
I have a house where I go
Where no one can be;
I have a house where I go,
Where nobody every says “No”
Where no one says anything – so
There is no one but me.
(A.A. Milne Now We Are Six)

I love this poem by A.A. Milne as it reflects what poetry means to me – the creation of my own world, as well as allowing me to enter another world, or reclusiveness, regardless of where I am physically.

I also love writing children’s poetry, particularly in rhyme. My published poetry to date hasbeen in rhyming verse but when I teach poetry workshops in schools I try to include some exercises covering rhyming and non-rhyming styles. Children are so open to all styles, and their creations and interpretations should never be underestimated.

Writing a good poem or verse can take hours and hours of hard work, but it is always so satisfying to see its transformation from a chrysalis into a beautiful butterfly.

Some poems of course require little or no interpretation. They may have simply been created for learning numbers or letters of the alphabet. But interpretation of some children’s poetry can be like peeling apples – removing the skin and taking a bite can expose a variety of delightful sensations.

Thanks for dropping in, Helen.

Helen Ross is a Brisbane-based writer/poet and children’s author/poet. She is also known as Miss Helen.

You can view some of Helen’s giggle poems on her website at: http://www.misshelenbooks.com

Helen also blogs about her writing journey – the good, the bad, the ugly, and the crazy, as well as particular writing issues. Her blog is: http://misshelenwrites.wordpress.com

What Kathryn Apel Likes about Children’s Poetry

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I’m delighted to welcome another guest blogger. Today, Kathryn Apel has called in to share with us what she likes about children’s poetry. Welcome, Kat.


Poetic Imagery

By Kathryn Apel

Shaping a poem

the body builder

pumps

flexes

tones and

tautens

as

snip

snap

snip –

the gardener

prunes and shapes

and

whoosh!

the very

clumsy clown

colours the sky

with brightly bobbing

balloons of

thought

I often think that poets paint pictures with words, but when I’m writing poetry, I get three distinct visual images – and they’re all of me! Let me put you in the picture…

Firstly, I see myself as The Body Builder. Okay – so this is a bit of a joke, because in reality I can’t lift more than a bar of chocolate. BUT – The Body Builder tones up by pumping iron. As a writer, I tone up by pumping poetry. Composing poetry flexes creativity. It hones vocabulary. It pinpoints weaknesses and forces me to focus on specific ‘muscles’. The more poetry I write, the greater my control of my writing muscles – of words.

Secondly, I see myself as The Gardener – a topiary artiste, intent on pruning and shaping; looking at the bigger picture and trimming it into a recognisable form. There is a certain ruthlessness in laying bare a thing of beauty. Poetry is a lot like a topiary tree – each word carefully placed to create a sharp, clear image. Excess words snipped away. There is no room for clutter. Each word must earn its place.

Thirdly, I see myself as The Clumsy Clown clutching fistfuls of colourful helium balloons… but can she keep them all in her grasp? Poetry has a way of releasing thoughts to, float, fly, drift and swirl like a bunch of brightly bobbing balloons.

When writing poetry, I am carried away by my imagination…

Congratulations Sally, on the release of your second verse novel. ‘Pearl Verses the World’ was stunning. I know that ‘Toppling’ will be another rich, warm story to touch the heart. Hugs to you! And thankyou for letting me share your blog space.

Thanks, Kat. I feel inspired to go pump some iron now 🙂

You can learn more about Kathryn Apel by visiting her online. She is the author of This is the Mud and Fencing With Fear.

Writing Quote of the Week

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Merry Monday! It’s time for this week writing quote – and, as always, it’s a good one:

Good stories are not written. They are rewritten.

(Phyllis Whitney)

How are you at editing? I know I find it one of the hardest bits of the job. The story flows out of me during the first draft – but when I’m finished the hard slog starts. But it’s the editing that turns a story into a manuscript – and that makes the difference between it staying an unpublished manuscript or being snapped up by a publishing house and becoming a book.

Have a great week.

What Katrina Germein Likes About Children’s Poetry

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If you are a regular visitor to this blog, you’ll know that throughout March I’m having lots of vsitors, dropping in to help me celebrate the release of Toppling by sharing what it is that they like about children’s poetry. Today’s visitor is Katrina Germein. Thanks for dropping in, Katrina.

The Poetry of Friendship

My friend Anna has always been smarter than me. When we were ten she handed me this:

Cloths of Heaven

Had I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
(William Butler Yeats )

“Isn’t it beautiful?” said Anna. “Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.”
We were sitting in her father’s office, beside the very trendy Mac. (My family had a Commodore 64.) Anna was obviously moved by the poem.
“It’s so beautiful,” she repeated. “Sort of like she’s walking on eggshells and if she crushes them she crushes his dreams. His life.”
“Who’s walking on eggshells?” I asked.
“The lady.”
I hadn’t realised there was a lady in the poem. I didn’t really understand any of it, ‘embroidered cloths’ and ‘half-light’, but I pretended to sort of get it because it seemed important to Anna.
“My dad loves it too,” she said.

It wasn’t the time to reveal the poems that my stepdad and I enjoyed together.

Poems like this:

Wolloomooloo
Here’s a ridiculous riddle for you:
How many o’s in Woolloomooloo?
Two for the W, two for the m,
Four for the l’s, and that’s plenty of them.
(C J Dennis )

And this:
When you squeeze the tomato sauce bottle
First none’ll come out
And then a lottle
(Anon )

And this:
I eat my peas with honey;
I’ve done it all my life.
It makes the peas taste funny,
But it keeps them on the knife.
(Anon )

That year at school camp Anna and I performed our own adaptation of Jack and the Beanstalk from Roal Dahl’s Revolting Rhymes. It was the sort of poem I loved. A poem that rolled along as you read it out loud. A poem that was fun to learn by heart and told a story you could understand and giggle at.

My daughter borrowed Revolting Rhymes from the library last year. As she recited her favourites to me I was back at school, on the small patch of grass beside the veranda, rehearsing for camp with Anna at lunchtime.

The year following our Jack and the Beanstalk item Anna and I composed our own poem to perform. (Poetry wasn’t mandatory for camp concerts. It probably wasn’t very cool either. But we were drawn to it.) We wrote a parody of Clement Clarke Moore’s Twas the Night Before Christmas, set in the future. I think I can remember the first few lines:

Twas the night before Christmas when all through the dome
Not a machine was stirring, not even a phone
And you in pyjamas and me in my suit
Had just settled down to play Trivial Pursuit

“You have the gift of the rhyme,” said Anna as we wrote it.
“Huh?”
“You have a gift for rhyming.”
I’d never been told I had a gift for anything before. I knew I loved rhyme, I had my stepfather to thank for that, but a gift? Well that’s what Anna said and she even appeared to believe it. So when I later came across this poem I understood it perfectly.

How I Got To Be a Princess
Yesterday my friend said,
“You look just like a princess.”
I could not believe him.
Was he talking to someone else?
I looked behind me
and
in front of me.
I looked under the bed
and
on top of the closet.
No one else was there.
Again my friend said,
“You look just like a princess.”
He really said it to ME!
I felt all twinkling inside.
That’s how I got to be a princess.
(Bobbi Katz)

When my rhyming book Baby Gets Dressed was published last year Anna read it to her infant son then said to me, “You’ve always had the gift of the rhyme.”
And I should have answered, “Because you gave it to me.”
Anna made me a rhyming princess.

Recently I emailed Anna, What was that poem you used to love about treading on some one else’s dreams, like eggshells? And swiftly from another state it arrived.
Now I can agree with Anna. Honestly. It is beautiful. It just took me twenty-five years to catch up.

‘How I Got To Be a Princess’ by Bobbi Katz is used with the author’s permission: How ‘I Got To Be a Princess’ from Upside Down and Inside Out: Poems for All Your Pockets by Bobbi Katz. Copyright © 1971.

Australian children’s author Katrina Germein writes picture books. Her book Big Rain Coming boasts over ten years in print, international publication and CBCA Notable Book recognition. Katrina wrote Big Rain Coming while working as a teacher in a remote Aboriginal Community. Katrina’s other titles include Baby Gets Dressed which was selected for the 2009 Advertiser Little Big Book Club Reading Pack. This year sees the release of two new books, Littledog and My Dad Thinks He’s Funny. Katrina lives in Adelaide with her husband and their three children. Her web address is http://www.katrinagermein.com/

Thanks for dropping in, Katrina. What a wonderful friend Anna sounds – I wish every child could have a friend to share poetry with.

What Alison Miles likes about Children’s Poetry

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As part of my celebrations of the release of Toppling, I have invited my writing friends to drop into my blog throughout this month to chat about what they like about children’s poetry. Today, I’m delighted to welcome Alison Miles, librarian and writer. So, without any further ado, here’s Alison.
summer watermelon moments

What fun to be guest blogging on Sally’s site on what I like about children’s poetry!

I like the zing of verse novels; their raw emotional intensity. They look just like other novels sitting on the shelf, but open them and you find words, carefully chosen words strung together in free verse with the power to crumple your heart and open your mind.

I discovered YA verse novels while working in a school library, first Steven Herrick’s, then Margaret Wild and Catherine Bateson’s titles. I was amazed how these authors could tell such compelling tales using so few words and so much white space. On the first page the reader is introduced to the characters, the narrator and the situation and then quickly flung into the action. The reader feels a part of this wild ride. It can be a quick read because of the economy of words, but intense.

Children love poetry written for them because it speaks of their experiences, their lives. Think of Laura Purdie Salas’ Stampede!: Poems to celebrate the wild side of school. And to have these poems read aloud or performed! Audiences quickly make the connection that poetry is life captured on the page (or stage). Congratulations to Sally, who’s adding to the genre with Toppling.

My challenge: add a poetry wall to your home, your school, your place of work. Encourage people to write their poems in ink, on postcards or post-its, or project poems onto the surface. Use magnetic poetry. Poetry forces you to clarify your thoughts.

Just like that pure moment when you bite into your first summer watermelon!

Alison is a Townsville librarian with a blog (the-storyspace) and a website (wordbox4writers). She plays Street Poet while out walking.

Thanks for dropping in and sharing your thoughts, Alison!

sallymurphy.com.au