Poetry Friday: Nocturne Scuphum

If you’re wondering just what the heck the title of this blog means, then read on, dear blog-follower!

I need to once again thank one of my fellow poet friends (in this case, the illustrious David L. Harrison) for introducing me to a new poetic form, the Scuphum stanza, named after the British poet who invented it, Peter Scuphum. Earlier this week on his blog, David shared that he was working on a new poetry collection, and that one of the poems he was crafting was going to consist of 3 Scuphum stanzas, which are made up of a sextet (6-lines) utilizing a rhyme pattern of a-b-c-c-b-a, in which each line contains the same number of syllables.

Meter is optional, but I figured, hey, why not challenge myself all the way??
(all poems here are © 2020 Matt F. Esenwine, all rights reserved)

So I thought about it for a few minutes, and as a one-off, I posted this on David’s link:

Sounds like fun!
I’ll have to try.
I’d hate to write
something trite,
but I am sly –
and now I’m done.

.
David appreciated my attempt, and since it was a fun little challenge, I decided to post another on his blog:

I’m filled with glee
and still not done
with this new form
outside the norm –
it’s rather fun,
as you can see!

.
Yes, I was having fun, indeed. So I decided I would put a little more time into it and see if I could come up with something a little meatier…and this is the result. (Funny how I tend write so many nighttime poems at night – go figure!) It’s a rough draft that only took about half an hour, so take it for what it’s worth – but I kind of like it as a possible stepping stone for a longer story:

(click to enlarge)

.
So thank you, David, for the inspiration. I’m going to need to play around with this potential narrative and see where it’s leading me. And by the way, I’ll be featuring David’s brand-new poetry collection, After Dark (Wordsong, 2020) on Feb. 28 as part of a blog tour celebration of the book’s release that week, so don’t miss it!

In other news, there’s a big cover reveal coming in just a few weeks for that picture book written with Charles Ghigna (aka, Father Goose®)! Beaming Books has scheduled the publication date for August 18, and I cannot wait for you to see it. Illustrator Andrés F. Landazábal has done an amazing job creating soft, beautiful imagery that is simultaneously brilliant and colorful while also soft and pastoral. And many thanks to the incredibly talented Tara Lazar, who will be hosting the official cover reveal on her blog Feb. 10, as soon as she wraps up this year’s Storystorm!

Catherine at Reading to the Core is hosting Poetry Friday today, so head on over to her blog to find the complete roundup of blogs and links, as well as a few of her #haikuforhope from last month.

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: A holiday surprise from Nikki Grimes

Christmas may be weeks behind us and even Epiphany, aka “Little Christmas,” was five days ago…but I’m grateful to poet Nikki Grimes for keeping the holiday alive just a little longer.

Pepparkakor!

You see, back in December she had mentioned on Facebook how she missed eating pepparkakor cookies, thin, spicy cookies similar to ginger snap cut-outs, when she had visited Scandinavia some years back. So, since pepparkakor are a tradition here at the house, and since I had just finished baking about 8 dozen of them, I offered to send her some!

She thanked me, and I was glad she enjoyed them.

That was that.

Until I received a small package in the mail yesterday…

Hmmm…what could this be??

From the return address I could see it was from Nikki, but couldn’t imagine what it was. I wasn’t expecting anything, certainly…but whatever it was, was beautifully packaged! So I untied the bow, and what did I discover inside?

A half-dozen of Nikki’s handmade cards, using her own beautiful photos, along with a special handmade card (upper right) thanking me. Homemade cookies = handmade cards! What a wonderful gift! And included with these cards, an original poem:

Longing for light,
we wade through the darkness,
hands outstretched.
One glimpse of the North Star,
and we lift our voices:
“O, Holy Night!”

– © 2019, Nikki Grimes

.
Now, what’s especially special about this (if I can put those two words together), is that “O, Holy Night” is my favorite Christmas song, hands down…Nikki had no idea, either, which made this even more surprising and touching. So thank you again, Nikki! I’m so grateful for your support, as well as for the words you share with us all through your novels, poems – and Christmas cards!

The Poetry Friday roundup is being hosted “down under” today with Sally Murphy, who reassures us that she & fellow children’s author Kathryn Apel are both safe, despite the horrors of the Australia wildfires. She’s sharing a sneak peek at her new upcoming book AND a seaside poem that is just perfect for those of us in the middle of a frigid northeast winter.

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: Looking back at 2019 and welcoming 2020 with CYBILS Awards finalists!

The last night these little babies will be lit. Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

While everyone seems to be thrilled with the promise of what lies ahead for us in 2020, I’m still reflecting on how incredible 2019 was for me.

“It was a very good year…”

Professionally speaking, it was probably the best year I’ve had so far since I began this journey in 2009, with FIVE manuscripts sold – including a picture book written with the incomparable Charles Ghigna (aka, Father Goose®). I had set a goal for myself of selling one manuscript per year – not unattainable, but certainly not a slam-dunk sort of thing for someone who is still in the early stages of his career. So 2019 really surprised me!

Elsewhere, I had a poem included in the late Lee Bennett Hopkins’ anthology, I Am Someone Else (Charlesbridge, 2019) and a couple of other poems found themselves in Michelle H. Barnes’ newest poetry anthology. I also was asked by Kristen Wixted and Heather Kelly at The Writer’s Loft in Massachusetts if my friend Kip Wilson (White Rose, Versify, 2019) and I would help judge poems for their new anthology, Friends and Anemones: Ocean Poems for Children. (How awesome a title is that??)

So proud to be part of this crew! NCTE presenters, L-R: Mary Lee Hahn, Liz Steinglass, Yours Truly, Heidi Mordhorst, Laura Purdie Salas

Other significant accomplishments included having a poem included in an important Donald Hall tribute anthology; another poem winning the Robert Frost Farm and Derry (NH) Public Library’s MacGregor Poetry Prize; seeing Flashlight Night (Boyds Mills and Kane, 2017) on the short list for two New Hampshire Literary Awards for Best Picture Book; and attending my first NCTE conference in Baltimore, where I co-presented a poetry workshop (“Wonder as a Way In: Teaching Reading and Writing Poetry through Inquiry”) with a number of fellow writer friends. The fact that I got to visit Edgar Allan Poe’s grave site – as well as family members I’ve not seen in years – was icing on the proverbial cake!

In-between all this, I also managed to sell my parents’ house, which had been a huge time-depleting and emotionally draining project. So yes, I’m looking forward to seeing what 2020 has waiting for me, but I’m pretty proud of everything I’ve accomplished in 2019.

What IS waiting in 2020? Well, aside from Friends and Anemones (which comes out in November), that picture book I wrote with Charles Ghigna is scheduled for an August 18 publication date from Beaming Books (keep watching here for a cover-reveal SOON!).

“But wait, there’s more!”

Two of those manuscripts I sold last year (board books from Rainstorm Publishing) are planned for release this summer and a third manuscript, a picture book, might also sneak in before the end of the year. On top of all this, the new poetry anthology Construction People (Wordsong, 2020), one of Lee Bennett Hopkins’ final anthologies, has a March 17 release date…and I just learned about two weeks ago that I will be part of another anthology coming out within the next year or so.

Oh, and did I mention I’m participating in Tara Lazar’s Storystorm 2020 this month? No? Well, I am – because, you know, no matter how many ideas a writer has, one can never have too many!

So yes, I have a lot to look forward to in 2020, much of it due to good fortune that occurred in 2019. One final thing we can all look forward to in 2020 are the CYBILS Awards! Out of all the books nominated last fall, finalists have now been officially announced, and I was proud to once again be part of the first-round panel of judges who determined the poetry finalists:

Dreams from Many Rivers: A Hispanic History of the United States Told in Poems (Henry Holt) (Amazon, IndieBound)
by Margarita Engle, illustrated by Beatriz Gutierrez Hernandez

Ink Knows No Borders: Poems of the Immigrant and Refugee Experience (Triangle Square) (Amazon, IndieBound)
Edited by Patrice Vecchione and Alyssa Raymond

Ordinary Hazards: A Memoir (Wordsong) (Amazon, IndieBound)
by Nikki Grimes

Other Words for Home (Balzer + Bray) (Amazon, IndieBound)
by Jasmine Warga

SHOUT (Viking Books for Young Readers) (Amazon,IndieBound)
by Laurie Halse Anderson

Soccerverse: Poems about Soccer (Wordsong) (Amazon, IndieBound)
by Elizabeth Steinglass, illustrated by Edson Ike

The Proper Way to Meet a Hedgehog and Other How-To Poems (Candlewick Press) (Amazon,IndieBound)
by Paul B. Janeczko, illustrated by Richard Jones

You can read all about them HERE. There was a great deal of quality writing this year and it was very difficult for us to come to a decision about which seven books would move on to the second round, but congratulations to all, and I wish the judges good luck with a task that is decidedly not easy.

What’s this, you want more poetry? Well, for all of today’s Poetry Friday links, please visit Carol’s Corner for the complete roundup, featuring a very appropriate poem from Maya Angelou. And thank you so much for all the support you’ve lent – it really means a lot, as I continue to move forward in this career I’ve found myself in. Best wishes for health, happiness, and success for you, as well, in the year ahead!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: My very first poetry collection…from 40 years ago

Today’s the day.

After months and months and months of cleaning out my parents’ house – the house I grew up in – it is finally being sold.

By the time you read this, we may have already closed the sale, in fact. It’s bittersweet, as there are a lot of memories inside and out…but considering how long it has taken me and how much work it’s been, I’m glad to be able to put this chapter behind me.

Boxes of letters mom and dad exchanged while he was stationed in Germany in the early ’50’s.

Mom and dad are now both together in the local nursing home, and if you have frequented this blog at all during the past 16+ months, you know that cleaning out a house filled with 60+ years of married life has been a long, arduous process dotted with sporadic bursts of nostalgia, amazement, and melancholy. (See a few random posts HERE, HERE, and HERE) Being an only child has meant no sibling-squabbling about who gets what…the problem is, I’m the one who gets it all, and I have no idea where to put it!

Now, granted, I have found lots of things I had completely forgotten about.
Like my high school artwork…

…news clippings…

 

…and assorted mementos from my senior year…

So having found these lost relics, I’m glad I had the opportunity to peruse the museum warehouse home before it was sold. I’m also fortunate to have been able to revisit my “hideout,” a small area of woods just outside the boundaries of our lawn, where more than one adventure transpired:

(If you wonder where I got the idea for “Flashlight Night”…this is likely the spot)

But one of the most surprising things I discovered hidden away among the childhood drawings…

…the models…

…and the toys…

Boxes and boxes of original, late ’80’s-era McDonald’s Happy Meal toys!

…was a little book (if I may call it that) I didn’t even realize existed! I estimate I was probably around 10 years old when I produced this little poetry collection for my mother. Honestly, I don’t even remember writing poetry at this age, so this really took me by surprise:

That’s right…only 4 pages, and one of them is a full-page display ad promoting my next book. If I knew anything at that age, it was how to market. (By the way, speaking of marketing…)

Up until now, I thought my first “book” was a high school creative writing class project I also discovered while cleaning, but apparently I had been publishing years earlier and had completely forgotten. So as bittersweet as it is to say goodbye to my childhood home, I do have some memories, poetry and artwork – and a 50-year-old bottle of Mercurochrome – to hold onto.

Time for me to put all this memorabilia away for now. 2020 is looking like a banner year for Yours Truly, with as many as FOUR books coming out along with a poetry anthology, so I’ve got plenty to keep me busy. I’ve also got several other manuscript submissions to get to before I hunker down and begin this year’s cookie-baking marathon.

So enjoy your weekend, and please encourage your kids to pursue their interests and dreams…one never knows where those dreams will lead! If you’re looking for more poetry, my friend Liz Steinglass, with whom I presented at NCTE last month, is hosting Poetry Friday today with her “favorite word!”

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “Construction People” preview! (and an NCTE review!)

One of the highlights of my 4-day visit to the National Council of Teachers of English annual convention in Baltimore (aka, #NCTE19) was getting to spend some time with my friends at Boyds Mills & Kane, the publisher of Flashlight Night and many of the poetry anthologies of which I’ve been a part.

In addition to poets Nikki Grimes, Georgia Heard, Rebecca Kai Dotlich, Laura Purdie Salas, and many others, I finally had a chance to catch up with marketing manager Kerry McManus, who has been invaluable in helping promote my book for the past 3 years. I also got to say hello again to my Flashlight Night editor, Rebecca Davis, who surprised me with something…

I think my first words were, “We have a book! It’s a real book!!”

Construction People, the follow-up to 2018’s popular School People, is one of the late Lee Bennett Hopkins’ final poetry anthologies; Hopkins passed away in August and left about a half-dozen projects in various states of progress, including this one. I was told he had seen the F&Gs (folded & gathered) like the one above, but never had a chance to hold the bound, finished product in his hands. I know he would have been as proud of his book as we, the contributors, are of being part of it – it’s already received a starred review from Kirkus!

How I end up in books with luminaries like Pat Lewis and Charles Ghigna is still a mystery…but a happy mystery!

All pages © 2020 Wordsong/Boyds Mills & Kane, all rights reserved (click to enlarge)

I’ll be sharing more selections and news about the book a few months from now, along with my poem (a villanelle, for you poetry geeks out there) in its entirety when it is officially released on March 17. But you don’t need to wait – you can pre-order now!

At the Boyds Mills & Kane exhibit booth: a tribute to the inimitable Dear One, Lee Bennett Hopkins.

After all these years…I’m finally face-to-face with Nikki Grimes!

Laura Purdie Salas helped guide me through the ins and outs of the crazy-busy NCTE schedule. (And she helped keep me fed, too, which is always a plus)

Another highlight of my trip – indeed, the initial reason I decided to go – was a poetry workshop I presented together with Heidi Mordhorst, Mary Lee Hahn, Laura Purdie Salas, and Liz Steinglass, who organized the workshop. What a weekend! I’ve never presented a workshop at a conference I’d never attended before…but there’s a first time for everything, they say, and this was mine.

To backtrack just a bit, the night I arrived, author/poet/blogger Laura Shovan gathered a bunch of Poetry Friday folks together at a local restaurant and we filled up half the place:

Back row, L-R: Heidi Mordhorst, Christie Wyman, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, Kathryn Apel, Tabatha Yeatts, Janet Fagal, Yours Truly. Front row, L-R: Carol Varsalona, Irene Latham, Laura Purdie Salas, Laura Shovan (photo courtesy Laura Purdie Salas)

The next day, Friday, the day of our workshop, more of us got together at a local sandwich shop (because all we apparently live for is eating and writing. Not that there’s anything wrong with that):

L-R: Tim Kulp, Linda Kulp, Marcie Flinchum Atkins, David L. Harrison, Liz Steinglass, Yours Truly, Irene Latham, Kathryn Apel. (photo courtesy Laura Purdie Salas)

And of course, I couldn’t travel all the way to my original hometown of Baltimore without making a little side trip to visit a certain poet:

   

If you’re looking for more poetry, then be sure to head over to today’s Poetry Friday roundup, where Tanita S. Davis is hosting the festivities at her blog, [fiction, instead of lies]!

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

     

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “She Keeps Me from My Sleep” – plus #NCTE19!

I’m so thrilled to be at this year’s National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Conference in Baltimore right now! This is my first year at NCTE (and the first time I’ve back back in my birth city since 1996), and I’m very excited to be an official representative for Flashlight Night‘s publisher, Boyds Mills & Kane.

As I’ve been preparing, I’ve been looking through many of my old files…and came upon this poem, which I wrote 10 years ago. There are some lines/words I could tweak – but I like what I did here, so I’m sharing it in all its unedited, unpolished glory…
.

She Keeps Me From My Sleep

My head, precariously balanced
sandbag on a spine;

ears deadened, mute screaming
silence of a heartbeat;

eyes sting, dry as a river rock
water flows over and over
time, erodes away.

Fingers falter, fail to write
words I fail to find; dumb and blind,
I gain no peace.

– © 2009 Matt Forrest Esenwine, all rights reserved

.

For more poetry, I hope you’ll visit Rebecca Herzog at Sloth Reads, where she’s hosting today’s complete Poetry Friday roundup. And if you are here at NCTE, I hope you’ll say hi! Here’s my schedule:

Friday, 7-7:45am, Grand Ballroom I & III:

FIRST-TIMERS’ WELCOME! Having never been to NCTE before, I suppose this is probably an important thing to attend, yes?

Friday, 3:30-4:45 pm, Room #315:

I’ll be co-presenting “Wonder as a Way In: Teaching Reading and Writing Poetry through Inquiry” – a poetry workshop with authors and educators Laura Purdie Salas, Liz Steinglass, Heidi Mordhorst, and Mary Lee Hahn. We’ll share activities designed to approach reading, writing, and appreciating poetry through the process of inquiry.

Saturday, 9:30-10:30 am, Hyatt Regency Inner Harbor, Atrium, Level 2, Nonfiction Children’s Book Salon:

An “unofficial” session, thisis an opportunity to grab a coffee and talk nonfiction (picture books, middle grade, and YA) with Lerner and Chronicle editors Carol Hinz, Melissa Manlove, and Shaina Olmanson.

Saturday, 12:30-2:30pm, Children’s Book Awards Luncheon:

I’ll be hosting one of Boyds Mills & Kane’s tables, so I’m very eager to meet and hang out with so many writer and teacher friends! (Plus, I’ll have copies of Flashlight Night on hand!)

Sunday, 7-8:45am, Children’s Literature Assembly (CLA) Breakfast:

Caldecott Honor author/illustrator Yuyi Morales will be discussing her work, including her newest book, Soñadores / Dreamers (Holiday House, 2018).

And of course, I’ll be popping in and out of sessions here and there and trying to spend as much time with my writer and educator friends as possible. If you do see me, please stop and say hello! (Hint: I’ll be sporting my winter beard, so if you come across a fellow who looks like The Most Interesting Man in the World’s balder, less-interesting brother…that’s probably me)

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

   

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “The Best of Today’s Little Ditty,” volume 3 – and gearing up for NCTE!

My friend and fellow writer/blogger Michelle H. Barnes not only loves to read and write children’s poetry…she devotes a significant amount of her time promoting it via her blog, Today’s Little Ditty. Each month, Michelle features different children’s authors and poets who challenge her readers with writing poetry in a variety of ways, and every couple of years she compiles the best poems into a poetry anthology.

And the latest edition is out now!

As Michelle explains in her own blog post, a “ditty committee” of 12 readers, writers, and bloggers (including Yours Truly) reviewed more than 500 poems written during 2017 and 2018. We whittled the list down to 96 poems by 57 different poets – and they’re all in here for you to read and enjoy.

I am pleased to learn I have three poems included in the book; one is my response to a challenge by Jane Yolen and J. Patrick Lewis to write an “epitaph poem” following their visit to Michelle’s blog…

© 2018, Matt F. Esenwine, all rights reserved

.

I was also pleased to learn from Michelle that she is including SEVEN poems that resulted from the challenge my Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (POW! Kids Books, 2018) co-author, Deborah Bruss, and I put forth to her readers! (You can learn more about that challenge HERE.)

So congratulations again to Michelle! I hope you’ll stop by her blog post today to check out more details on this brand-new book, and be sure to pick up a copy and show your support for children’s poetry. And since Michelle is hosting Poetry Friday today, you can check out all the links to all the children’s poetry posts out there in the kidlitosphere!

=========================================================

If you’re planning to attend this year’s National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Conference in my original hometown of Baltimore, I hope you’ll say hi! This will be my first year at NCTE (and the first time I’ve back back in my birth city since 1996!), and I’m very excited to be an official representative for Flashlight Night‘s publisher, Boyds Mills & Kane. Here’s my schedule:

Friday, 7-7:45am, Grand Ballroom I & III:

FIRST-TIMERS’ WELCOME! Having never been to NCTE before, I suppose this is probably an important thing to attend, yes?

Friday, 3:30-4:45 pm, Room #315:

I’ll be co-presenting “Wonder as a Way In: Teaching Reading and Writing Poetry through Inquiry” – a poetry workshop with authors and educators Laura Purdie Salas, Liz Steinglass, Heidi Mordhorst, and Mary Lee Hahn. We’ll share activities designed to approach reading, writing, and appreciating poetry through the process of inquiry.

Saturday, 9:30-10:30 am, Hyatt Regency Inner Harbor, Atrium, Level 2, Nonfiction Children’s Book Salon:

An “unofficial” session, thisis an opportunity to grab a coffee and talk nonfiction (picture books, middle grade, and YA) with Lerner and Chronicle editors Carol Hinz, Melissa Manlove, and Shaina Olmanson.

Saturday, 12:30-2:30pm, Children’s Book Awards Luncheon:

I’ll be hosting one of Boyds Mills & Kane’s tables, so I’m very eager to meet and hang out with so many writer and teacher friends! (Plus, I’ll have copies of Flashlight Night on hand!)

Sunday, 7-8:45am, Children’s Literature Assembly (CLA) Breakfast:

Caldecott Honor author/illustrator Yuyi Morales will be discussing her work, including her newest book, Soñadores / Dreamers (Holiday House, 2018).

And of course, I’ll be popping in and out of sessions here and there and trying to spend as much time with my writer and educator friends as possible. If you do see me, please stop and say hello! (Hint: I’ll be sporting my winter beard, so if you come across a fellow who looks like The Most Interesting Man in the World’s balder, less-interesting brother…that’s probably me)

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

   

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “The Art of Autumn”

This post was originally published two years ago, in 2017, while the poem itself had initially been shared on Carol Varsalona’s blog, Beyond Literacy, as part of her “Finding Fall” gallery, back in 2014. So today, with trees nearly bare and some light snow in the forecast, I thought I’d share it once again…

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(click to enlarge)

Will you be attending this year’s National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Conference? in Baltimore? If so, I hope you’ll say hi if you see me! This will be my first year at NCTE, and I’m very excited to be an official representative for Flashlight Night‘s publisher, Boyds Mills & Kane. Friday afternoon, I’ll be co-presenting “Wonder as a Way In: Teaching Reading and Writing Poetry through Inquiry” – a poetry workshop with authors and educators Laura Purdie Salas, Liz Steinglass, Heidi Mordhorst, and Mary Lee Hahn. We will share activities designed to approach reading, writing, and appreciating poetry through the process of inquiry.

Then Saturday, I’m honored to host one of Boyds Mills & Kane’s tables at the Children’s Book Awards Luncheon, so I’m very eager to meet and hang out with so many writer and teacher friends!

For today’s complete Poetry Friday roundup, be sure to visit my friend and fellow NCTE presenter, Irene Latham, at her blog, Live Your Poem!

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

  

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “Mummy Problems”

It may be the day after Halloween, but here at the ol’ Triple-R we’re going to continue celebrating a little longer…with some help from my friend Michelle H. Barnes! Yesterday, Michelle shared a brief little “ditty” I wrote as a response to a writing challenge on her blog, Today’s Little Ditty.

You think you’ve got problems? Imagine how mummies feel, with all those wrappings and loose ends; staggering around half-dead ain’t as easy as it looks, y’know. If you’d like to gain some insight and empathy into what frightens mummies, click HERE!

Will you be attending this year’s National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Conference? in Baltimore? If so, I hope you’ll say hi if you see me! This will be my first year there, and I’m very excited to be co-hosting one of Boyds Mills & Kane’s tables at the Children’s Book Awards Luncheon on Saturday. Representing Flashlight Night‘s publisher is a tremendous honor for me.

Also, the day before the luncheon, I’ll be co-presenting “Wonder as a Way In: Teaching Reading and Writing Poetry through Inquiry” – a poetry workshop with authors and educators mummiLaura Purdie Salas, Liz Steinglass, Heidi Mordhorst, and Mary Lee Hahn – so I’m very eager to meet and hang out with so many writer and teacher friends!

Looking for more poetry? Tabatha Yeatts is hosting today’s Poetry Friday roundup at her blog, The Opposite of Indifference, along with info on how to design your own writing retreat and her annual Winter Poetry Swap!

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

  

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “October Daybreak”

(click to enlarge)

You may have seen this photo a week or so ago when I shared it on Instagram and Facebook…I took it around 6:30 one morning as the sun was just starting to break through the trees that line the field across the road from our house. I loved watching the ebb and flow of the dense fog, as if it was my own personal cloud. I knew at some point I’d have to write a poem about it.

Today, I did!

And by the way, I’m very excited to share the news that I’ll be one of the authors Boyds Mills & Kane is sponsoring for one of their tables at the NCTE Conference’s Children’s Book Awards Luncheon next month! This year is my first attending The National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Conference, so I’m thrilled to not only be able to go, but to be able to represent Flashlight Night‘s publisher.

And the day before the luncheon, I’ll be presenting a poetry-focused workshop with authors and educators Laura Purdie Salas, Liz Steinglass, Heidi Mordhorst, and Mary Lee Hahn – so you can imagine how eager I am to hang out in my birth city of Baltimore with so many writer and teacher friends!

For today’s complete Poetry Friday roundup, head over to Karen Edmisten’s blog , where she is also celebrating October with a poem by Helen Hunt Jackson.

Very proud to be a first-round judge in the CYBILS Poetry category, once again!

=========================================================

Ordering personalized signed copies online?
Oh, yes, you can!

  

You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!

Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it for you, and then they’ll ship it. Try doing that with those big online booksellers! (Plus, you’ll be helping to support local book-selling – and wouldn’t that make you feel good?)

=========================================================

Thank you to everyone for your support!

• NY Public Library’s “100 Best Book for Kids 2017” AND “Staff Pick!”
• KIRKUS Starred review!
• Kansas NEA Reading Circle Recommended Books!
• “Best Reads of 2017,” Unleashing Readers
• Finalist, 2019 New Hampshire Literary Awards
• Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness!
  .
  . 
  • “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
  • “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
  • “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars”     – Tulsa Book Review
  • “Rhythmic…funny and informative”     – Unleashing Readers

=========================================================

Did you like this post? Find something interesting elsewhere in this blog? I really won’t mind at all if you feel compelled to share it with your friends and followers!

To keep abreast of all my posts, please consider subscribing via the links up there on the right!  (I usually only post once or twice a week – usually Tues. and Fri. – so you won’t be inundated with emails every day)

 .

Also feel free to visit my voiceover website HERE, and you can also follow me via Twitter , Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!