Poetry Roundup
BEFORE MORNING by Joyce Sidman . . . This picture book contains a single poem, but what a lovely, haunting poem it is! The form of this poem is an invocation, and as such it seems like it could have been an outtake from her previous collection, WHAT THE HEART KNOWS. Can a single poem beat out an entire collection of good ones? Better be one heckuva poem!
ECHO ECHO by Marilyn Singer . . . This is a companion book to her earlier collections, MIRROR MIRROR and FOLLOW FOLLOW, which applied her inventive reverso form to various fairy tales; this one does likewise for Greek myths. I wondered whether these books relied too heavily on the gimmicky form rather than beautiful language, but I’ve softened my stance somewhat.
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FREEDOM IN CONGO SQUARE by Carole Boston Weatherford . . . Like BEFORE MORNING, this is a single poem, but I’m not sure that any piece of text lingers in my mind as much as this one does: “Mondays, there were hogs to slop, / mules to train, and logs to chop. / Slavery was no ways fair. / Six more days to Congo Square.” It just insinuates itself into my brain. So infectious!
FREEDOM OVER ME by Ashley Bryan . . . Shortlisted for the Kirkus Prize, Bryan here gives voice to a dozen slaves by imagining their lives and their voices. I love the idea of this book, and the illustrations are lovely, but I’m not feeling the poetry here which likely means that I need to spend more time with it. Poetry improves with each reading, so you really need to read a poem a half dozen times before you can properly evaluate it.
JAZZ DAY by Roxanne Orgill . . . Winner of the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for Picture Book, this is actually a poetry collection inspired by that famous photograph of several dozen great jazz musicians taken by Art Kane for Esquire magazine in 1958. The wonderful illustrations mean that this one will also be in the Caldecott conversation. I probably need to spend more time with the text–it is always so with poetry–but even so I’m not sure this is the strongest contender on this list.
WET CEMENT by Bob Raczka . . . Probably the best book that you haven’t heard about this year, but should have. It’s concrete poetry! If you remember the work of John Grandits (TECHNICALLY, IT’S NOT MY FAULT, BLUE LIPSTICK), then this is cut from the same excellent cloth. Like ECHO ECHO, I think this one could be perceived as too gimmicky compared to other offerings mentioned here, but I’d love to be proven wrong!
WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES by Julie Fogliano . . . We’ve seriously flirted with both of Fogliano’s picture book collaborations with Erin Stead. This is her first collection, and perhaps its time to give her a more serious look. It reads like a diary of four seasons: “march 22 / just like a tiny, blue hello / a crocus blooming / in the snow”
Have we had this kind of depth in the poetry books in recent memory? There are several books here that I would be quite pleased with, if the Newbery committee felt so inclined.
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About Jonathan Hunt
Jonathan Hunt is the Coordinator of Library Media Services at the San Diego County Office of Education. He served on the 2006 Newbery committee, and has also judged the Caldecott Medal, the Printz Award, the Boston Globe-Horn Book Awards, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. You can reach him at hunt_yellow@yahoo.com
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I’ve only read three on this list, but I have strong opinions about all three.
1.) CONGO: I love Carol Boston Weatherford’s poetry. Marilyn Nelson and Kwame Alexander are the only two poets who come anywhere close to her level of talent. I was swept away in CONGO. The meter, the pace, the evocative imagery, the rhythm – it’s all here. And it’s all so beautiful. I wonder, too, if a single poem can stand up to a volume, but I would love to see this heavily decorated this awards season. It’s Weatherford’s masterpiece.
2.) FREEDOM: I wonder if this one was a case of Too Much Buzz for me, similar to the way PAX capsized under the buzz. It was good, but I was drawn more to the art and to the “wow” factor of the presentation of theme. Although that’s certainly one of the criteria for the Newbery, I don’t know that it hold up in other realms for me. This isn’t to diminish the poetry here – it’s certainly admirable, but it lacks the subtle beauty that Weatherford so astonishingly captures.
3.) JAZZ: This one floored me when I read it. Having re-read a couple of the poems, though, I wonder if I was drawn more to the combination of text and art. The art here is flawless. The poems? Pretty hit or miss. There’s some clunkiness and gimmickry employed in a couple of poems that just felt flimsy in such a slim collection. I still love the book – 5 star love it, even – I just don’t think it’s going to hold its own, poetry-wise, in a year of such tall trees.
Before Morning is practically perfect — though the story told in the pictures really does add to the book. The author’s note at the end is longer than the text of the poem. This one, the pictures combined with the text make it so excellent. Can a short poem compete on its own?
When Green Becomes Tomatoes is also excellent. The theme of the year’s passing is carried out well. And they are child-centered poems. That’s about all I remember now… but I have to agree it’s a strong year for poetry.
I haven’t gotten a hold of BEFORE MORNING yet. I’ve read the rest, and WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES is actually my personal #1 pick this year (so far). I would make these two points: 1) it works for an unusually large age range — I think much of it could be read without trouble to pre-schoolers and even toddlers, and certainly I had no qualms about reading it to my then 6-year-old daughter — but the poems can also be deeply appreciated and enjoyed by older children (and adults) and, better still, serve as accessible models for their poetic impulses. 2) On this blog, it’s sometimes claimed poetry collections are inherently uneven, and that shouldn’t be held too much against them. I think WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES maintains an astonishingly consistent high quality.
P.S. I think about 2/3rds of Judith Viorst’s collection, What Are You Glad About? What Are You Mad About? is Newbery quality.
I agree with everything you’ve written here, Leonard. Your post actually inspired me to read the book and I’m so so glad I did.
This book is a stunner.
BEFORE MORNING is lovely and beautiful, but I’m not sure that it is SO amazing, that every single word is so perfectly chose,n that such a relatively short poem really stands up to longer works, either longer works of poetry, longer picture books, or the total apples/oranges of a full novel. This is also a book where the illustrations really added a lot for me. That second story that gives depth and layers to the invocation is interwoven with the work as a whole in my mind. Unfortunately my copy is out, so I can’t re-read it while purposefully ignoring the pictures.
CONGO is a wonderful book as a whole package, but I was having some trouble seeing the text alone as distinguished. I was struggling with the rhythm that everyone else is praising. In the quoted piece, for instance, I constantly stumble over that third line. I think maybe because I tend to pronounce it “slav – ry” rather than “sla-ver-ry” and that throws off the meter because I’m doing it wrong? There are several places where as I was reading it, I had to think to myself “if I read this aloud, I’m going to have to practice this part if I want to get the rhythm right.” Now obviously there are very few books that can be read aloud perfectly without reviewing first, but in a short poem that relies on the swing of the words, I notice tiny things more. I’m not a poetry person as a general rule, so I feel like I’m not the ideal audience for discussing it based purely on poetry.
(I posted this over on Calling Caldecott when CONGO was discussed there)
I’m not sure how much the text and illustrations’ interplay count toward the Caldecott, so my comments may not be entirely on-target. But I had a few issues with this book that I want to be sure to mention now that I have a copy in front of me again (after having read it many months ago!)
Christie’s artwork is stunning, there is no doubt about it. And this is the rarely-told history of a slice of the slavery experience in Louisiana that I was utterly and somewhat shamefully unaware of. However, for the age group, the text concerns me. When I showed it to a group of kids there were a few that got the sense that slaves did certain tasks each day of the week, such as the hog slopping on Mondays, the cow feeding on Tuesdays, the bed making on Wednesdays. Of course I clarified that, but they weren’t sure why it read as it did even after my explanation. Some of the phrases scan a bit clumsily, too (“slavery was no ways fair”; “always more chores to be done”; “gauze, silk and percale”). The one spread where there is a lack of interplay between the text and art is on Thursday, when spirituals rose, though there is nothing in the art that indicates singing.
All that said, I wouldn’t be surprised to see this receive attention in January, despite the concerns I have about it.
As much as I love BEFORE MORNING and FREEDOM IN CONGO SQUARE, I think there brevity makes them a hard sell. Fortunately, I think both of them will be in the Caldecott discussion. WET CEMENT is likely to be the most popular with students, but I think WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES probably fits the criteria the best. We’ll have to take an extended look at that one in the near future.
I finally finally finally read WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES.
It is, hands down, the most magnificent collection of poetry I’ve read in years – surpassing any of the books in this post and even last year’s MY SENECA VILLAGE, which I thought was a masterpiece.
The poems in this slim volume are wow-worthy. From the opening imagery of birdsong poking gentle holes in the cover of winter to the elegiac ode to pumpkins and the somber meditations on snow, TOMATOES is not only a work of art itself but it is also a lovely introduction for children to the art of poetry. There is such grace and mastery at work here – poems so thoughtful and carefully written, such lovely examples of meter and rhythm and internal rhyme – that they could be used in elementary, middle, and high school classes. There is so much to appreciate here.
I’ve read the July 9 poem about two dozen times and marvel at it with each and every reading.
Wow. Just… wow.
This one might be the one to beat this year.
At a discussion of books there was much praise for WHEN GREEN BECOMES TOMATOES with only two minor concerns:
One was the poem on July 10 that the title comes from – and perhaps it’s the illustration that’s the problem. As these seasons Fogliano seems to write about are in a northern climate (NY, New England), tomatoes turning red on July 10 seems dubious. She writes that there WILL be red, etc. but the illustration shows the tomatoes red.
The other is my concern – a related issue about the seasons. This calendar she writes is very Northeastern, which seems like a bias that the publishing industry (and some authors) cannot seem to shake. Of course there are places in the US with snow on the ground on March 20 (Boston in 2015, for sure!), but increasingly that is the exception rather than the rule. How does the child in Georgia, in Texas, in Arizona relate to “season-specific” books like this, especially with included dates? Of all of the concerns that we raise about inclusion and diversity, this is one that I don’t think has been addressed very well. While I understand that this may be Fogliano’s reality, and it’s her poems to write the way she wishes, it has a universal tone that I don’t think is very universal at all.
Brenda, I am not sure about this second concern. Certainly the current zeitgeist seems to favor writing what you know and discourages writing what you don’t know. But if we’re going to ding Julie Fogliano for writing what she knows, simply because it comes from a place labeled as culturally dominant, then it’s a no-win. When Kathi Appelt or Sheila Turnage write with a strong sense of place, they garner praise. I hope that praise is because of their talents as writers, not because they write of Texas or North Carolina. And certainly few seem to worry about Bostoners reading something like True Blue Scouts. Your point about universality is interesting — that if the author is seemingly *trying* to be universal, then specificity of place may be insensitive. I personally think the very specificity and detail of Fogliano’s work (not just snow but ocean beaches – so even four season Midwesterners are shut out in this line of thinking…) argues against this interpretation of her intended tone. I think this line of thought was more telling when made about PAX, where the vagueness of setting did suggest an attempt at universality that arguably failed because of inclusion of details like the playing of baseball.
This does veer into one’s politics. There is inevitably a fine line between affirmative action, which I favor, and reverse discrimination, which I don’t.