The Beatryce Prophecy

"Answelica was a goat with teeth that were the mirror of her soul -- large, sharp, and uncompromising." 

Thus begins Kate DiCamillo's 2021 story about young Beatryce.  What could possibly be more frightening than the goat who opens the story?  A strong willed girl who can read and write, that's what.  Only Beatryce's unlikely companions - among them the goat, an illiterate orphan, and a monk with a wobbly eye - recognize that these gifts were given her to fulfill her destiny. 

"What is it to know that people will come searching for you?  Everything."  This is Beatryce's hope as she waits in the dark to be led to where she belongs...to her home.

Another heartwarming novel from DiCamillo, weaving together suspense, delight, and laughter while introducing young readers to words like "benign," "antipathies," "beatific," and "prodigious."

A worthwhile read.

Turns of Phrase

From The Memory of Old Jack - another Port William tale full of beauty and sorrow - come these turns of phrase as only Wendell Berry can spin:

"And always near him was the thought of the dead woman who had loved him as he was and of the living one who could not."

"It is the blessing and trial of his old age that his mind goes back to inhabit again and again the body of the man he was."

"He was her cross, and she bore him with a submission that, afterwards, chilled him to the bone." 

"His labor is no longer work, but a striving against the effrontery of circumstance."

"Lying in the bare room whose curtainless windows admitted the bright, implacable gaze of the stars, he knew that he had become the incarnation of his solitude."

Again, they must resume their journey, the long return of dust to dust."

"She wants what she cannot ask and he cannot give.  He sees it in her eyes.  It makes a sorrow in him that only his grave will heal."

"He became again the true husband of his land, but now  his work was healing."

"She had made of herself a sort of portable occasion for the ostentatious gifts of her husband."

"The cost of living beyond his time is putting up with the various noises and contraptions of these new times."

"Now he must cease to be a son to the old men and become a father to the young." 

The Pained Underside of Severity

Mat Feltner: "I think of the pain I've given to my children.  Especially to Virgil.  You hope for a realization in them, finally, that the pain is given out of love, inept and blundering and blind and wrong as it can sometimes be, I don't worry so much about Bess.  She's had a family of her own long enough to know the terrified love you can sometimes have for your children.  But Virgil I feel like I owe an accounting to.  There's maybe only weakness in it.  You want your good intentions recognized, even the failed ones.  You want it known by the ones nearest you that your good intentions are a real part of your life, and your love for them." 

Hannah studied his face, seeing in it an old man's sorrow for the imperfection of his life and fatherhood. She understands suddenly how a young man might be borne up, might justify everything, by the hope of perfection - and growing old, must realize that he has done nothing perfect.  She knows that Mat has allowed her to see, as Virgil never was allowed to, the pained underside of his severity.  

--A Place on Earth, Wendell Berry

The Hotel Balzaar

In March of that year, Marta and her mother arrived at Hotel Balzaar. They were given an attic room that contained a bed, a sink, and a battered chest of drawers. 

In her new "home" Marta is to be quiet as a mouse and disturb no one. But the insatiable curiosity of the young girl is stronger than her will to be silent. 

If that little snippet doesn't pique your interest, I feel sure the introduction to Norman Francis Binwithier (the sleeping bellman), or Alfonse (the exceedingly straight-edged desk clerk), or the flamboyant countess and her General-turned-parrot companion, just might. 

If those characters also fail to draw you in, well then you may be nigh hopeless.  But I'm certain no one can resist being mesmerized by Julia Sarda's exquisitely detailed illustrations, (my poor quality snapshot does not convey the full glory of her images)

The Puppets of SPELHORST

The Puppets of Spelhorst are filled with a longing they can’t name.  Each one has a unique characteristic by which they define themselves, but in the absence of purpose they can only boast of their uniqueness and downplay each other’s.  

• The Owl boasts of his real feathers.  His longing to pontificate wisely masks his truer longing to FLY.
• The King boasts of his crown.  His longing to command others masks his truer longing for MUSIC.
• The Wolf boasts of her sharp teeth.  Her longing to destroy masks her deeper longing for FREEDOM.
• The Boy boasts of his arrows.  His longing to do important deeds masks his truer longing for LOVE.

As their journey progresses, each gets a taste of The Thing they longed to do, but they end up abandoned and alone, missing one another and unsatisfied by their momentary experience.  Their true glory and the fulfillment of their deepest longing only comes when they experience The Thing in community with one another and for a greater purpose.

Kate has done it again.  She has woven a tale that captivates a child's imagination, while tapping deep into the soul of the adult reader. It is, as I've come to expect from her, both delightful and insightful.  

A Place on Earth

Wendell Berry's powers of observation and his ability to capture essence with unparalleled economy - of a person, an event, a landscape, a community, an experience, a photograph -  remains unmatched.  Here's a tiny sampling from the 300+ pages of A Place on Earth:

Jarrat Coulter - "It is a severe manhood that Jarrat has, that feeds on its loneliness, and will be governed by no head but its own."

Uncle Jack - "He relishes his ciphering.  The figures come into his mind smelling of barns and grain bins and tobacco and livestock.  His figures grunt and bleat and bray and bawl.  This is the passion that has worn him out and made him old, and is still a passion.  As he labor over it, the notebook becomes as substantial in his hands as a loaded shovel."

Mat Feltner - "This is the crisis of increase - what he was born to, and what he chose.  When he has done all that can be done, he is at peace with himself.   His labor has been his necessity and his desire."

Brother Preston - "The Word, in his speaking it, fails to be made flesh.  It is a failure particularized for him in the palm of every work-stiffened hand held out to him at the church door every Sunday morning - the hard dark hand taking his pale unworn one in a gesture of politeness without understanding."

Gideon Crop - "There is evidence everywhere of the presence of a strong, frugal intelligence, the sort of mind that can make do, not meagerly but skillfully and adequately, with scraps. He had the gifts of quiet endurance, of tolerance of rough work and poor tools, of makeshift, of neatness in patched clothes, of thrift."

Aunt Fanny - "That these things have grown out of the ground into their secret places apart from anybody's intention, and that she takes them familiarly and freely without attempting to take them all, that they are the harvest of a ramble and not a search or a labor, all this bespeaks a peaceableness between her and the world."

Roger - "Roger is lying on the big four-poster bed, wearing shirt and tie and coat and hat, generously covered with quilts, his head propped up against the bare headboard - sound asleep, his bottle propped beside him, a large briar pipe lying extinguished on his chest.  That he has escaped burning up is owed, according to some, only to the Lord's noted solicitude for drunkards and fools."

A Practiced Drunk

"They watch him pass in front of the most distant of the houses and come slowly down the row of them toward town, his walk a little unsteady but neither awkward nor faltering; he never strays out of his direction.  It is the gait of a man intricately skilled and practiced in being drunk. There is a ponderous grace about it like that of a trained elephant or a locomotive.  He sways heavily back and forth across the line of his direction, like a man carrying a barrel across a tightrope, his progress a sequence of fine distinctions between standing up and falling down.  His drunkenness has become precise."

--A Place on Earth, Wendell Berry

Reconciliation in Shakespeare

Several of Shakespeare's plays "end with elaborate scenes of reconciliation that all of them are designed from the first act to bring about.  This is to say, reconciliation is their subject.  And what happens in these scenes is no sorting out of grievances, no putting of things right.  Justice as that word is normally understood has no part in them.  They are about forgiveness that is unmerited, unexpected, unasked, unconditional.  In other words, they are about grace." 

--Marilynne Robinson, The Givenness of Things 

Wendell Berry - The Real Deal

Every now and then I operate under the delusion that I am a writer.  And then I go and read Wendell Berry and I am immediately divested of my delusion of grandeur.  This is one of many, many passages in Hannah Coulter that struck me as particularly wise and beautiful.  There were dozens and dozens of descriptions of the ordinary that gripped and drowned me in a whirlpool of longing and sadness and beauty and joy. 

"You think winter will never end, and then,when you don't expect it, when you have almost forgotten it, warmth comes and  a different light.  Under the bare trees the wildflowers bloom so thick you can't walk without stepping on them.  The pastures turn green and the leaves come.

You look around presently, and it is summer.  It has been dry a while, maybe, and now it has rained.  The world is so full and abundant it is like a pregnant woman carrying a child in one arm and leading another by the hand.  Every puddle in the lane is ringed with sipping butterflies that fly up in a flutter when you walk past in the late morning on your way to get the mail. 

And then it is fall and the cornfields are ripe and the calves are fat and shiny and the wooded valley sides are beautiful with color.  The sun is bright, the air clear, and the shadows dark.  There is the feeling of completion and storing up and getting ready.

You have consented to time and it is winter.  The country seems bigger, for you can see through the bare trees.  There are times when the woods is absolutely still and quiet.  The house holds warmth.  A wet snow comes in the night and covers the ground and clings to the trees, making the whole world white.  For a while in the morning the world is perfect and beautiful.  You think you will never forget.

You think you will never forget any of this, you will remember it always just the way it was.  But you can't remember it the way it was.  To know it, you have to be living in the presence of it right as it is happening.  It can only return by surprise.  Speaking of these things tells you that there are no words for them that are equal to them or that can restore them to your mind.

And so you have a life that you are living only now, now, and now and now, gone before you can speak of it, and you must be thankful for living day by day, moment by moment, in this presence."  --Hannah Coulter

History as Moral Philosophy

The historian of morals and ideas has a mission no less austere than that of the historian of events.  The latter has the surface of civilization, the struggles of the crowns, the births of princes, the marriages of kings, the battles, the assemblies, the great public men, the evolutions in the sunlight, all the exterior; the other historian  has the interior, the foundation, the people who work, who suffer, and who wait, overburdened woman, agonizing childhood, the dumb wars of man with man, the obscure ferocities, the prejudices, the established iniquities, the subterranean reactions of the law, the secret evolutions of souls, the vague shudderings of the multitudes, the starving, the barefooted, the bare armed, the disinherited, the orphans, the unfortunate and the infamous, all the goblins that wander in darkness.  He must descend with a heart at the same time full of charity and of severity, as a brother and as a judge, to those impenetrable casemates where crawl in confusion those who bleed and those who strike, those who weep and those who curse, those who fast and those who devour, those  who suffer wrong and those who commit it.  Have these historians of hearts and souls lesser duties than the historians of the exterior facts?  Do you think that Dante has fewer things to say than Machiavelli?  Is the underworld of civilization, because it is deeper and more gloomy, less important than the upper?  Do we really know the mountain if we do not know the cavern?

We must say, however...a decided separation between the two classes of historians might be inferred, which does not exist in our mind.  No man is a good historian of the open, visible, signal, and public life of the nations, if he is not, at the same time, to a certain extent, the historian of events, and vice versa.  They are two different orders of different facts which answer to each other, which are always linked with and often produce each other.  All the lineaments which Providence traces upon the surface of a nation have their dark but distinct parallels, in the bottom, and all the convulsions of the bottom produce upheavals at the surface.  True history dealing with all, the true historian deals with all.  

--Victor Hugo, Les Miserables

Remembering Dickens

In honor of Charles Dickens' 200th birthday, I'd like to offer some opening lines from his works.  The man was a master architect of The Sentence and ought to be appreciated as much for his stylish craftmanship as for his ability to devise tales which are simultaneously insightful, intriguing, and delightful.   I have made it my goal to finish reading all of his novels this year.  That's a LOT of novels!

That punctual servant of all work, the sun, had just risen, and begun to strike a light on the morning of the thirteenth of May, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-seven, when Mr. Samuel Pickwick burst like another sun from his slumbers, threw open his chamber window, and looked out upon the world beneath.   (Pickwick Papers)

Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.  (David Copperfield)

Although I am an old man, night is generally my time for walking.  (The Old Curiosity Shop)

There were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a plain face on the throne of England; there were a king with a large jaw and a queen with a fair face on the throne of France.  In both countries it was clearer than crystal to the lords of the State preserves of loaves and fishes, that things in general were settled forever.  (A Tale of Two Cities)

Never can there come fog too thick, never can there come mud and mire too deep, to assort with the groping and floundering condition which this High Court of Chancery, most pestilent of hoary sinners, holds, this day, in the sight of heaven and earth.  (Bleak House)

And of course, my all-time favorite:

There once lived, in a sequestered part of the county of Devonshire, one Mr. Godfrey Nickleby: a worthy gentleman, who, taking into his head rather late in life that he must get married, and not being young enough or rich enough to aspire to the hand of a lady of fortune, had wedded an old flame out of mere attachment, who  in her turn had taken him for the same reasons.  Thus two people who cannot afford to play cards for money, sometimes sit down to a quiet game for love.  (Nicholas Nickleby)

I, for one, am thankful that he shared his gift with the world!  Happy birthday, Mr. Dickens, Sir.

Love's Labours Lost

What do you get when you cross Shakespeare, Branaugh, and Gershwin?  A rousing and hysterical rendition of Love's Labours Lost!!

Kenneth Branaugh might be nearly as brilliant as Shakespeare was.  It's nearly impossible to improve on his original works, but Branaugh just might have done that with his delightful "musical" interpretation. 

I strongly suggest you watch this play.  Unless you're exceedingly uptight and have lost all sense of humor, you can not help but smile repeatedly at the cleverness of both of these men. 

Here is a selection from one of the foundational and highly poetic passages from the play: (Act IV, Scene 3)

From women's eyes this doctrine I derive:

They sparkle still the right Promethean fire;

They are the books, the arts, the academes,

That show, contain and nourish all the world:

Else none at all in ought proves excellent.

Then fools you were these women to forswear,

Or keeping what is sworn, you will prove fools.

For wisdom's sake, a word that all men love,

Or for love's sake, a word that loves all men,

Or for men's sake, the authors of these women,

Or women's sake, by whom we men are men,

Let us once lose our oaths to find ourselves,

Or else we lose ourselves to keep our oaths.

Food of Fools 5

For another take on the deception of flattery, listen to this excerpt from Geoffrey Chaucer's The Nun Priest's Tale:

Of course, we all know what happens from this point, don't we? 

"Chanticleer began to beat his wings.  He stood high on his toes and stretched his neck, closed his eyes and crowed loudly.  At once the fox jumped up, grabbed Chanticleer by the throat and carried him towards the woods." (from Barbara Cooney's version for children)

In real life, the danger of flattery isn't always as obvious as it is in these tales.  Afterall, we all like to hear positive words about ourselves.  We want so badly to believe what we are hearing that we allow ourselves to ignore any warning signs that accompany the words.  The wisdom of a meek and humble heart acts as a guard to help us recognize and resist the lure of flattery. 

May God grant us and our children this wisdom!

Food of Fools 2

Here is the first of several tales that bring sharply into focus the dangers of flattery.  Howitt spins a great little story, but the book's real genius lies in its artwork, which brilliantly illuminates the wily character of the flatterer and the simple-mindedness of the one who succumbs to his charm.  (the book is not here in its entirety, so you'll have to buy one in order to fully appreciate it!)

The Spider and the Fly

by: Mary Howitt

Will you walk into my parlour?" said the Spider to the Fly,

'Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy;

The way into my parlour is up a winding stair,

And I've many curious things to shew when you are there."

"Oh no, no," said the little Fly, "to ask me is in vain,

For who goes up your winding stair can ne'er come down again."

(I've omitted 2 stanzas here)

"Sweet creature!" said the Spider, "you're witty and you're wise,

How handsome are your gauzy wings, how brilliant are your eyes!

I've a little looking-glass upon my parlour shelf,

If you'll step in one moment, dear, you shall behold yourself."

"I thank you, gentle sir," she said, "for what you 're pleased to say,

And bidding you good morning now, I'll call another day."

The Spider turned him round about, and went into his den,

For well he knew the silly Fly would soon come back again:

So he wove a subtle web, in a little corner sly,

And set his table ready, to dine upon the Fly.

Then he came out to his door again, and merrily did sing,

"Come hither, hither, pretty Fly, with the pearl and silver wing;

Your robes are green and purple -- there's a crest upon your head;

Your eyes are like the diamond bright, but mine are dull as lead!"

Alas, alas! how very soon this silly little Fly,

Hearing his wily, flattering words, came slowly flitting by;

With buzzing wings she hung aloft, then near and nearer drew,

Thinking only of her brilliant eyes, and green and purple hue --

Thinking only of her crested head -- poor foolish thing! At last,

Up jumped the cunning Spider, and fiercely held her fast.

He dragged her up his winding stair, into his dismal den,

Within his little parlour -- but she ne'er came out again!

And now dear little children, who may this story read,

To idle, silly flattering words, I pray you ne'er give heed:

Unto an evil counsellor, close heart and ear and eye,

And take a lesson from this tale, of the Spider and the Fly.

Proverbs 29:5 - "A man who flatters his neighbor is spreading a net for his steps."

First Lines

Have you ever picked up a book, opened to the first page and been absolutely enthralled by the first sentence or the first paragraph? . Here are some of my all-time favorite openers which immediately hooked me. Can you guess the authors and/or the titles? I've left out names which would make it TOO obvious. And there will be no CHEATING!! No googling!

1. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. (Jane Austen - Pride & Prejudice)

2. You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of ____; but that ain't no matter. That book was made by______ and he told the truth mainly. There was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the truth. (Mark Twain - The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn)

3. So. The Spear Danes in days gone by and the kings who ruled them had courage and greatness. We have heard of those princes heroic campaigns. There was ___, scourge of many tribes. A wrecker of mead benches, rampaging among foes. This terror of the hall-troops had come far. A foundling to start with, he would flourish later on as his powers waxed and his worth was proved. In the end, each clan on the outlying coasts had to yield to him and begin to pay tribute. That was one good king. (Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf)

4. ____ cut a comical little figure as he wobbled his way along the cloisters, with his large sandals flip-flopping and his tail peeping from beneath the baggy folds of an oversized novice's habit. (Brian Jacques - Redwall)

5. The last drops of the thundershower had hardly ceased falling when the Pedestrian stuffed his map into his pocket, settled his pack more comfortably on his tired shoulders, and stepped out from the shelter of a large chestnut tree into the middle of the road. (C.S. Lewis - Out of the Silent Planet)

6. In a hole in the ground there lived a ____. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a ____ hole, and that means comfort. (J.R.R. Tolkien - The Hobbit)

7. Besides the neutral expression that she wore when she was alone, Mrs. Freeman had two others, forward and reverse, that she used for all her human dealings. Her forward expression was steady and driving like the advance of a heavy truck. Her eyes never swerved to the left or right but turned as the story turned as if they followed a yellow line down the center of it. She seldom used the other expression because it was not often necessary for her to retract a statement, but when she did, her face came to a complete stop, there was an almost imperceptible movement of her black eyes, during which they seemed to be receding, and then the observer would see that Mrs. Freeman, though she might stand there as real as several grain sacks thrown on top of each other, was no longer there in spirit. (Flannery O'Connor - Good Country People)

8. There once lived, in a sequestered part of the country of Devonshire, one Mr. Godfrey ____; a worthy gentleman, who, taking it into his head rather late in life that he must get married, and not being young enough or rich enough to aspire to the hand of a lady of fortune, had wedded an old flame out of mere attachment, who in her turn had taken him for the same reason. Thus two people who cannot afford to play cards for the money, sometimes sit down to a quiet game for love. (Charles Dickens - Nicholas Nickleby)

9. It was___,it was____, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way - in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil in the superlative degree of comparison only (Charles Dickens - A Tale of Two Cities)

10. In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This was the beginning with God and the duty of every faithful monk would be to repeat every day with chanting humility the never-changing event whose incontrovertible truth can be asserted. But we see now through a glass darkly, and the truth, before it is revealed to all, face to face, we see in fragments (alas, how illegible) in the error of the world, so we must spell out its faithful signals when they seem obscure to us and as if amalgamated with a will wholly bent on evil. (Umberto Eco - The Name of the Rose)

Summertime in STL #2

The Shakespeare Festival of St. Louis has been performing on the grounds of Forest Park for the 8 summers now and has become a permanent fixture on the summer landscape. Unfortunately, I didn't know about it until last summer when they gave an exceptional performance of "Much Ado About Nothing." I had heard that they were changing the setting to a western theme...an idea I viewed with skepticism and even disdain; however, they did more than "pull it off"! It was exceptional! The boys and I went 3 times!

The performances begin at 8pm, but the festival provides entertainment for an hour or two beforehand, including:

Juggling Jeff - a traditional festival performer who, in addition to juggling knives and torches, escapes from a straightjacket in fewer than 60 seconds while standing on a pink rubber ball. Oooohhh!

A variety of local musicians provide entertainment

Those more intellectually inclined can attend mini lectures about Shakespeare, acting, or the particular play chosen for that year.

A group of youth join with some of the actors to present a condensed version of Richard III - imagine a 3-hour plot crammed into about 6 minutes...very funny, entertaining and informative!

Many people arrive between 5 & 6pm to stake their claim on a plot of ground, and bring along a picnic dinner and a bottle of wine. If you don't want to pack your dinner, you can purchase anything from a brat & Schlafly's to a Filet Mignon & Cabernet boxed dinner.

This is very much a family-friendly event and, in our experience, is best enjoyed with several families together for the evening.

The Tragedy of King Richard III was chosen for summer 2008. Since I had never read it before and no movie version has been released since Laurence Olivier's, I had some homework to do! As I usually do with Shakespeare, I read a children's adaptation first. I always reach for Charles and Mary Lamb's Tales from Shakespeare first, but they didn't include Richard III, so my second choice is Leon Garfield's Shakespeare Stories I & II. After getting the basic plot idea, I pick up the original and usually find it understandable. This one, though, required a little more study and historical background before I could fully place all the characters in their proper context.

The best thing about the festival is that, like so many venues in St. Louis, IT'S FREE. That's right...FREE!!

The worst thing about it, is that it is subject to the temperamental and unpredictable St. Louis weather! Tonight's performance (my second this year) got rained out. But the sunset was beautiful!

Poetry for 5th Graders

One of the hallmarks of classical methodology is the use of songs, chants and sound-offs to cement important factual information in the minds of young students (2 to 12 years old). Last year, I gave my students a "break" between literature books and we studied poetry for 1-2 weeks before taking up the next book. Initially, I read a wide variety of poetry to them so they could begin to enjoy the sound and feel of it. Next, the students were required to memorize a number of poems, mostly of my choosing. Then we spent time studying some of the terminology and "rules" of poetry.

The sound-off below was written for a public performance, so the first half is designed to entertain and inform the audience, while the second incorporates the foundational information which I wanted the students to retain and on which future teachers can build.

Poetry Sound-Off

By: Lori Shaffer

TEACHER: Poetry, like prose, is designed to move, inspire, teach and delight. Give a child - especially a boy of 10 years and older - sappy, sentimental, feminized love poetry, and instead of inspiration and delight, he will probably harbor a distaste for poetry. He won't call it distaste (that might be too poetic), he will call it hatred.

GIRL STUDENT: (with all the sweetness she can muster!)

Her heart is like her garden

Old-fashioned, quaint and sweet

With here a wealth of blossoms

And there a still retreat.

Sweet violets are hiding

We know as we pass by

And lilies pure as angel thoughts

Are opening somewhere nigh.

BOYS: (looking distressed and ill) Yuck!!

TEACHER: However, if we give our boys (and girls) the right poetry...well....judge for yourself...

2 STUDENTS: (taking the roles of father and son)

Father William

by Lewis Carroll

"You are old, Father William," the young man said

"And your hair has become very white;

And yet you incessantly stand on your head,

Do you think, at your age, it is right?"

"In my youth," Father William replied to his son,

"I feared it might injure the brain;

But now that I'm perfectly sure I have none,

Why, I do it again and again."

"You are old," said the youth, "and your jaws are too weak

For anything other than suet;

Yet you finished the bird with the bones and the beak;

Pray how did you manage to do it?"

"In my youth," said his father, "I took to the law

And argued each case with my wife.

And the muscular strength it gave to my jaw

Has lasted the rest of my life!"

TEACHER: Now, this kind of poetry definitely appeals to 5th graders, but if we want them to move beyond the nonsense, we must introduce poems like this:

BOY STUDENT: (in low, mysterious voice)

The Cremation of Sam McGee

by Robert Service

There are strange things done in the midnight sun

By the men who moil for gold.

The Artic trails have their secret tales

That would make your blood run cold.

The Northern Lights have seen strange sights

But the strangest they ever did see,

Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge

I cremated Sam McGee.

TEACHER: That was just the first verse of a gruesome, yet comical tale about two men's adventure during the Gold-rush. Most young men find tales of heros and battles irresistible...especially this classic:

STUDENT: (nobly and majestically)

So. The Spear-Danes in days gone by

and the kings who ruled them had courage and greatness.

We have heard of those princes' heroic campaigns.

There was Shield Sheafson, scourge of many tribes,

a wrecker of mead-benches, rampaging among foes.

This terror of the hall troops had come far.

A foundling to start with, he would flourish later on

as his powers waxed and his worth was proved.

In the end, each clan on the outlying coasts

beyond the whale-road had to yeild to him

and begin to pay tribute. That was one good king.

TEACHER: In case you didn't recognize it, that was from a contemporary translation of Beowulf by an Irish poet named Seamus Heaney.

Good poetry can also make profound theological statements, such as this Holy Sonnet # 10 by John Donne, in which he rebukes Death for overestimating his own power:

ALL STUDENTS:

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so!

For, those whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,

Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go,

Rest of their bones and soul's delivery.

Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war and sickness dwell,

And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well,

And better than thy stroke! Why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally,

And death shall be no more. Death, thou shalt die!

TEACHER: So...the right poetry can make all the difference! This year we have read some good poetry and we have learned some of the grammar of poetry - that is, its terminology and the rules that govern it. We will share those with you now.

(For this second half, all questions are asked by the teacher, while students take turns answering or illustrating the answer)

What is poetry?

Poetry is the language of pictures and music.

What are the pictures in poetry called?

The pictures in poetry are called "tropes" or "figures of speech." They utilize descriptive language to create an image in the mind.

Name, define, and illustrate some figures of speech:

A SIMILE is a figure of speech which compares two dissimilar objects, events, or ideas, using "like" "as" or "than."

Her hands were as cold as ice.

He was madder than an old wet hen.

His hair stood up like a corncob tassel.

A METAPHOR is a figure of speech which compares two object, events or ideas by stating that one IS the other.

Her hands were ice cubes.

My mother is a bear in the mornings.

PERSONIFICATION is a figure of speech which assigns human qualities to a non-human entity.

The wind crept through the open window.

The waves pounded the shore.

A RHETORICAL QUESTION is a figure of speech which asks a question whose answer is obvious, in order to remind someone of a truth.

Who do you think you are, young man?

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?

Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Who determined its measurements?

If figures of speech are the word-pictures of poetry, what are its musical elements?

The musical elements of poetry are rhyme and meter.

What is rhyme?

Rhyme is an echo of sound.

Name, define and illustrate two types of rhyme:

Full Rhyme occurs when the final sound of two or more words precisely echo one another - such as "shed, bread, fed, lead & dead"

Slant Rhyme occurs wehn the final sound of two or more words closely approximate one another - such as "stood, look, hoof, & soot"

Does all poetry rhyme?

No, some poetry does not rhyme and is referred to as Blank Verse.

What is meter?

Meter is the rhythm of poetry...the beat, if you will.

How is meter measured?

Meter is measured by identifying syllables as either stressed or unstressed.

What is a syllable?

A syllable is a unit of pronunciation consisting of a single sound.

What is meant by stressed and unstressed syllables?

A stressed syllable is pronounced with emphasis - it is a hard beat.

An unstressed syllable is pronounced withless emphasis - it is a soft beat.

What is scansion?

Scansion is thename for the process of identifying and marking the meter of a poem.

First, identify stressed syllables and mark them with an accent mark.

Next, mark all unstressed syllables with a breve.

Then, divide each line into feet.

What are feet in poetry?

Patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables create "feet" in poetry adn are equivalent to the "measure" in music.

Name, define and illustrate some common poetic feet:

Iambic Foot is comprised of 1 unstressed, then 1 stressed syllable (-'-'-'-')

Whose woods these are I think I know, His house is in the village though... (students should illustrate the meter by overemphasizing the stressed and unstressed syllables with their voices and with handclaps)

Trochaic Foot is comprised of 1 stressed, then 1 unstressed ('-'-'-'-)

Chip the glasses, crack the plates, That's what Bilbo Baggins hates...

Anapestic Foot uses 2 unstressed, then 1 stressed (--'--'--'--')

In my youth said his father I took to the law and argued each case with my wife...

Dactylic Foot uses 1 stressed, then 2 unstressed ('--'--'--'--)

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens...

This is the Grammar of Poetry as we know it in 5th Grade!

Real men love poetry! We do! Do YOU?!