Poetry Friday: “After the Storm”

It’s taken me 2 and a half-years of blogging, but I have finally determined one of life’s truths: I just can’t keep track of which poems I share here.

I’m usually pretty good about not re-posting poems, but it’s a miracle I don’t re-post more than I do. (I think I’ve only done it a couple of times…hard tellin’, not knowin’)

Having said that, I thought I’d share a little ditty I put together a couple years ago which I’d been saving for use in a winter-themed poetry collection. I’m still working on that collection, however, the theme has taken a bit of a turn, so I doubt I’ll be including this – hence, I’m posting it here for you to enjoy!

(Although I shouldn’t be so presumptive. I mean, who knows if you’ll enjoy it? Who am I am to assume you’ll enjoy it? If you don’t enjoy it, that will be precious time you’ve lost, and…well, maybe I should stop worrying.)

Anyway, I thought it would be appropriate, considering the winter season we’ve been having. (and considering I couldn’t tell if I’d shared it before!) For today’s complete and unfettered Poetry Friday roundup, please visit the one and only Liz Steinglass!

After the Storm

Shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

 .

only just begun…

  .

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

  .

wind is cold and blowing…

  .

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

  .

glad it’s almost done…

  .

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

shovel, shovel, shovel, shovel,

  .

What?!?

  .

  .

  .

.

.

I think it’s snowing!

– © 2012, Matt Forrest Esenwine

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Poetry Friday: “Dog Clown”

I’ve been quite busy this week – and if you can’t comprehend just how busy, I invite you to take a peek inside the mind of a writer! This past Tuesday’s post can fill you in…but it doesn’t fill you in on everything.

You see, since I shared that post, I’ve become wrapped up in another project! I had poems I wanted to write, a book to organize…but no. My brain had other plans.

Monday night, without warning, I was smacked in the cerebrum with an idea for another picture book. While I love coming up with ideas like this, they can be rather bothersome when one already has other plans. I had no choice but to scrap those plans and get to work writing this new picture book.

As with all my picture book concepts, I do a fair amount of research to determine if anything like it is already in the marketplace – and I haven’t come across anything quite like this. That’s a good sign! So now that I’ve completed the first few drafts, I need to work on polishing it.

And then I hope to get back to the manuscript I was working on in the first place!

So for today, I’m sharing something I don’t ordinarily share:  a poem that has only seen one draft. It came about as I was thinking about this new picture book – and even though it has no business being in the book, it still ended up being written, anyway. Poems are funny like that. So I figured I’d share it here, since it may not show up anywhere else, and may never even get a second draft, for all I know. It’s simply a few lines about the “clowns of the dog world,” but it’s my first poem of 2015 so I’m going to post here whether you like it or not!

Last night the thing was stuck in my head; now it’s out and I can move on. Speaking of moving on, if you want to find more poetry, head on over to Tabatha Yeatts’ The Opposite of Indifference for the Poetry Friday roundup!

Dog Clown

In ancient times, dogs guarded castles and kings.
Protected their masters from all sorts of things.
They hunted. They battled.
Today, they might frown
upon seeing my shih tzu – on the bed, upside down.

– © 2015, Matt Forrest Esenwine

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “Steam Train”

There was a time when I used to wait for inspiration to strike.  Then I decided I needed to challenge myself to become a professional writer of poetry and create my own inspiration. (Or, at the very least, seize upon any and every opportunity to be inspired)

Case in point: Last week, writer and blogger Michelle H. Barnes featured writer/poet/editor/blogger/chocolatier Renee LaTulippe sharing one of her lyrical language lab’s lessons: sentence transformation via mood, effect, and emotion. In this series of posts, Renee encourages prose writers (and poets, as well) to improve their writing using poetic devices and techniques.

In her post, Renee used a sentence about a steam train as an example, and showed how to progressively develop the sentence into something more than “just” a sentence. As I read her suggestions and sentences – and thought about each of the photos she shared – the following four lines came to me. It’s another short poem like the one I shared last Friday, but between electrical wiring issues, a blown boiler, and a father who is in the hospital, life is still pretty nuts around here; fortunately for me, four lines was all the poem requested. Hope you like it…and be sure to visit Becky Shillington’s blog for today’s Poetry Friday Roundup!

Steam Train

Firebox flares,
steam shoots high;
smoky billows
shake the sky.

– © 2014, Matt Forrest Esenwine

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “Good night”

It’s been a crazy week around here. We lost power and water on Sunday, and although we have both of them finally back as of today, we’re still without heat. Fortunately, we rely on the wood stove more than the oil furnace, so we’re doing ok.

The reason I bring this up is because I’ve barely had any time – or even ability – to get any work done this week, let alone write. But as a writer, I’m always ‘working’, so I wanted to share this short little vignette which I wrote while thinking about the snow that was in the forecast for last night. As always, I hope you enjoy it…and be sure to visit Keri at Keri Recommends for today’s Poetry Friday celebration and a touching tribute to her dad from Alfred Lord Tennyson.

Good night

Like Mother’s whisper,
soft and low –
the gentle touch
of Autumn snow.

– © 2014, Matt Forrest Esenwine

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “Black Sheep”

I didn’t plan on writing about animals for the 3rd week in a row; it just sort of happened that way. Perhaps I’ve had creatures on my mind because I just spent all of last weekend working at the local state fair…and as I mentioned a few days ago, it was once again a big learning experience!

Be that as it may, I present a short little ditty today that wasn’t even written about the fair – but with the animal references, I figured this time of year would be as good as any! It was originally just an exercise, me tossing around some ideas and seeing what I could create…and when it came together, I rather liked it. Hope you do, too!

For more of today’s Poetry Friday offerings, please be sure to visit Laura Shovan at Author Amok!

Black Sheep

Break from the herd.
Take that leap.
Play the dark horse.
Be the black sheep.

– © 2014, Matt Forrest Esenwine

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Poetry Friday: “Honeybee”

I didn’t plan on writing a follow-up poem to last Friday’s “Yellow Jacket.”

Then again, I didn’t plan on getting stung a second time, either.

I also didn’t plan on writing three poems about honeybees – but after I wrote the first one, I realized it had potential for Highlights magazine and decided I shouldn’t share it publicly yet. I figured I’d write a second one that I could post here…unfortunately (or rather, fortunately), the second one I felt was very appropriate for the Cricket group of magazines, so that got nixed from my blog, too!

>sigh< Why do I keep making more work for myself??

(click to enlarge)

Getting back to my “inspiration” for these poems, the first sting I got was by a yellow jacket on the fleshy part of the inside of my right arm, between the bicep and triceps. He probably flew off, none the worse for wear, while I went running inside for an ice cube (carrying a 1-yr-old baby, who had been outside with me).

This time around, I was walking barefoot on our lawn – something I rarely do – and stepped on something that shot a searing pain into the second toe of my right foot. It wasn’t as bad a pain as the first time, but painful enough I knew I needed another ice cube! And although I didn’t see what I stepped on, my guess is that it was a honeybee, as many of them are zipping in and around all the clover that covers the yard.

Poor thing probably died, between stinging me and me clobbering it. They’re really not aggressive at all, and only sting when threatened – so it wasn’t the bee’s fault that this giant appendage called my foot came crashing down on his buffet table. I felt I had to write a little something in tribute; little did I know I’d write THREE things in tribute.

All this while I’m trying to finish up a new rhyming picture book manuscript…and live-announcing the Hopkinton State Fair all weekend long (in fact, that’s where I am at this very moment, so I won’t be able to visit many blogs this weekend).  I’m not complaining, mind you – just staggering backwards a bit at the enormity of my workload!

By the way, if you’re looking for more Poetry Friday happenings, check out Jone MacCulloch’s blog, Check It Out! And now, for no particular reason other than because it’s in keeping with the theme of today’s post and is infectiously catchy, I present to you three fellows who started a street-corner group while in college, pretending to be 19th-century singing automatons, and have built it into this…

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

 

Poetry Friday: “Constancy”

This post was originally published on August 3, 2012. It was my first poetry post on this blog, and only my second post ever, following my introduction. But since my wedding anniversary is August 10, I plan to repost it every year at this time. I wouldn’t be where I am without my wife, after all.  (And by the way, if you missed this past Tuesday’s post about writing without your muse, I invite you to check it out!)

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This is only my second posting on this blog, and although I knew I wanted to do something for Poetry Friday, it took quite a bit of deliberation to decide which poem of mine I should spotlight.  Children’s poetry or adult poetry?  Published or unpublished?  Happy or sad?  Funny or serious???

Well, after careful consideration, I decided I would post an unpublished poem I wrote a few years ago for the one person in the world who has done the most for me in my quest to become a published children’s author:   my wife, Jenny. Through her unwavering support (emotional, physical, AND financial), I’m able to pursue this dream along with all the other people who have been so helpful to me, like my kids, friends, and fellow writers.

This is a traditional Elizabethan sonnet (three quatrains with an a/b/a/b, c/d/c/d, e/f/e/f rhyme scheme followed by a rhyming g/g couplet) which I wrote as part of my wedding vows.  No, it doesn’t read as a contemporary poem; it was deliberately written in a sort of old-fashioned, classic sort of style. I wanted to express the thought that even though poets throughout history have written words of undying love and immutable steadfastness, my love for her surpassed all their metaphors, all their similes, all that they could ever have imagined.

Yes, I’m a romantic; I make no apologies.

I conclude my poem with a suggestion for them as to what they should compare their love to…but it’s not a rose or a star.

Looking back on it (indeed, even shortly after I’d written it), there are things I would have changed, edited, or revised – but I was under a deadline, of course, and this was what I came up with.  Unlike my other poems, “Constancy” will never be put through revisions, however.  These were the words I spoke to my wife on August 10, 2008 – in a voice loud enough that the entire state of Massachusetts could hear, by the way – and so they shall remain.  These words were part of my vows and are as unalterable as my love and gratitude for her.

Thanks again for saying “Yes,” Honey.

Constancy
For Jennifer

How many have, before me, tried in vain
To capture beauty, constancy, and love
Through fluent phrase, in happiness and pain,
And simile of summer, star, or dove?
Their words so eloquent, imagery lush –
In perfect imperfection testify,
For seasons change, the steadfast heavens rush
To swirl about themselves, and doves will die.
How best to show the one whom I adore
The fullness of my amorosity?
I fail to find a finer metaphor
Than that true love which you have shown to me.
The poets fail! Their thoughts do not dismiss;
‘Tis better they compare their love to this.

- © 2008, Matt Forrest Esenwine, all rights reserved

Franki and Mary Lee at A Year of Reading are today’s Poetry Friday hostesses-with-the-mostestesses, so be sure to visit their blog for all of today’s links!

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

 

Poetry Friday: “It’s the Thought That Counts”

Normally, I wrestle with which poems to share here each week. While I want to share everything, I have to hold myself back sometimes and not share a certain poem if I think it might be published at some point.

Today, I have no fear of that.

I wrote this quite a few years ago, when I was just beginning to get serious about my children’s writing…and had no idea how similar it was to another poem written by someone far more talented and far more famous than I will ever be. You might known who that person is and to which of his poems I’m referring; if so, you’ll understand why no editor will ever want to touch this. If you don’t know, I’ll keep quiet and let you enjoy the poem.

And for all of today’s Poetry Friday links – and a draft of a beautiful poem she’s writing – be sure to visit Margaret Simon at Reflections on the Teche!

It’s the Thought That Counts

I loaded up my backpack first,
So full of books, it’s set to burst;
Brushed my teeth and combed my hair,
Then put on something nice to wear.
While mom and dad were still in bed
I made some breakfast – jam and bread –
Then 7:30 on the clock,
Went out the door and down the block
To get to school on time, but wait –
I’m neither early nor too late;
I’m kind of sad, I have to say…
Apparently, it’s Saturday.

- © Matt Forrest Esenwine

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

Book review: “S is for Sea Glass”

I write poetry in a variety of styles and forms – some rhyming, some free verse. Some structured, some not quite so.

You can therefore imagine how refreshing it was for me to see a children’s poetry collection that offered this same sort of variety – not the cut-and-paste sing-song of simple rhyming verse, nor the page-after-page of non-rhyming, uneven line-length free verse (which can sometimes get heavy for children’s poetry). In the case of Richard Michelson’s S is for Sea Glass: A Beach Alphabet (Sleeping Bear Press, 2014), we’re talking about a smart, well-structured book that carries one theme – poems about the beach – but presents that theme in 26 different ways.

Because a trip to the beach or ocean carries with it so many different moods, sights, and feelings for a child, this book makes good use of poetic forms to highlight those differences. One minute the reader is contemplating the ebb and flow of tides, and the next he or she is chuckling over the author’s query of what, precisely, a mosquito is good for.
…..

H is for Horizon

Where does the sea stop and the sky begin?
Where does the sun rise when the dawn slips in?
Where does the ship sail when its sails disappear?
Is it under the ocean? Is it up in the air?

If I travel the world or stay here on this beach,
The horizon will always be just beyond reach.
But its real as my dreams and it’s always nearby -
That magical line where the sea meets the sky.

- Richard Michelson, reprinted with permission, all rights reserved

.

Doris Ettlinger’s illustrations perfectly match the poems, as they are neither trite nor bold nor ornate…but are simultaneously happy and calm, fun and reflective, cool and warm. The fact that it’s an alphabet book is almost superfluous.

Which, I suppose, is a good thing, as I feel many of the poems – most, in fact, read above the level of a child who would need to learn the alphabet. As a collection of poetry, as a book about the beach, as a book that reflects the wonders, mysteries, and joy of being ocean side…S is for Sea Glass is beautiful. The fact that it’s an alphabet book seems unnecessary.

Here’s another one of my favourites:
…..

R is for Rain

Nobody’s  at the beach today. ‘Most everyone’s complaining.
…..The sky is dark. The clouds are thick. And I, the Rain, am raining.

…..…...Folks let waves splash them head to toe. Do you hear any whining?
……….……….No!
…..…..…..They think it’s fun to get wet when their friend, the sun, is shining.

…..…..…..…..I cool the breeze. And fill the seas. Who’s not a rainbow lover?
…..…..…..…..…..So why, when I come out to play, do they all run for cover?

- Richard Michelson, reprinted with permission, all rights reserved

Like I said, smart, beautiful, relatable  poetry. And it’s poetry that makes children think as much as smile. Hopefully, the next time they go to the beach, some of the images will be fresh in their heads. I know many of the images are fresh in my head – but then again, I’ve been spending all week here by the ocean.

And I think it’s time I did some more refreshing. I hear the surf calling my name…

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!

 

RhyPiBoMo and the benefits of collaboration

You might think I’m here – but you’d be wrong!

I’m actually guest-blogging today at Angie Karcher’s blog, as part of a month-long celebration of National Poetry Month! Angie has created RhyPiBoMO (short for Rhyming Picture Book Month) as a way to get people motivated to write for children.

Earlier this year, I completed a collaboration project with a fellow picture book author, and the manuscript we’ve written would have never come to fruition without the two of us hammering things out, writing and editing, and sharing back-and-forth via Google Drive.

When two people with complimentary talents take an interest in something…awesome things can happen! Find out more HERE at Angie’s place, and be sure to check back here periodically throughout the month of April as the National Poetry Month celebration continues!

You can see the complete schedule for all of Angie’s guest bloggers on this calendar:

Click to enlarge, to see all of Angie’s guest bloggers this month!

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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 twice a week – on 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, Pinterest, and SoundCloud!