A Pocket of their Own

Every year since 2007, I have celebrated National Poem in Your Pocket Day in April with my sixth grade students, but this year we were on spring break when the big day rolled around. We are in the middle of the 100 Day Writing Challenge, though, which in April is a new poetry exercise every day, so I posted the information and asked students to tell us what poem they chose and why, a kind of virtual celebration.

To be honest, I didn't know what to expect, and so when I logged in last Thursday night to check on their progress, I was amazed and humbled by the quality of their choices and the consideration they had given to them. In fact, this group of kids did better than any other so far. Here are a few examples:

I chose the poem Kid, this is October, by Jeffrey Bean. This poem stood out to me by the word choice he uses. I liked when he said “You can swim one more time in the puddle of sun ” because that gives October coming a whole new perspective. This poem reminds me perfectly of how I felt when summer was ending and fall was coming. Finally, I liked this poem because it all flows so smoothly and just makes the poem better.

I chose a short haiku poem about forgetting the sorrows of your past and focusing on the present. This is how the poem goes:

What joy you will find
when you drop the yesterdays
and embrace today

I really like this poem because even though it is short, it has an important meaning that I think is a really good rule to live by. This poem always reminds me that I need to focus on the future and present especially, instead of living in the past. This poem has only three lines so I don’t have my top four lines, although I like that last line that says to embrace today.

I chose Caged Bird by Maya Angelou. I chose this poem because first of all I love Maya Angelou she is a strong female figure and is also black. The other reason I chose this poem is because this has a personal connection to me because this is literally the first poem I ever read, my first thought was the grammar was wrong and I LOVED it.

I chose “You Lose Something Every Day” by Willie Perdomo. The reason why I chose this poem was because at first it didn’t make sense to me but when I read it carefully I noticed that it is true. You do lose something every day even if it isn’t physical with you. I felt like this poem was trying to tell me how we also lose stuff in our mind or how we forget stuff. In this poem, something I also noticed is that each line has two important words. For example,”the finish on your way to the line” the two important words are Finish and Line and if we put it together it spells out finish line. Anyway I enjoyed understanding this poem and I really liked it.

War Within Myself by Daniel K.I chose this poem because "fighting a war within myself" is very common with people today, even me. I was diagnosed with anxiety a couple years ago, which felt like a new war had begun. Walking on eggshells relates to me because I feel like I need to say the right thing, at the right time, or else I mess it all up, which I have before. Tearing friendships apart relate to myself as well because I don't want to mess something up so badly, to the point where a beautiful friendship or relationship has ended. And I have one particular relationship that is so special to me that I don't want to end.