aidenfire | Poetry

You're viewing

aidenfire's journal
Create a Dreamwidth Account Learn More

Reload page in style: site light

Very quick question! What are your favorite poems/poets with non-poetry-readers, particularly teenagers? I want to do a little poetry event with my kids as part of April being National Poetry Month, and any suggestions are most welcome!

♥!

Crossposts: http://aidenfire.livejournal.com/300808.html

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

skidmo

I always use Shel Silverstein because I think a lot of people don't think of him when they think of poetry, but most people have really positive associations with him.

I also found that several of my students really liked "Fire and Ice." Langston Hughes is another good one. Rumi as well.

From:

aidenfire

Excellent suggestions, thank you!

From:

fleurlb

Billy Collins!

His poems are funny and so vividly visual and unexpectedly light hearted and serious at the same time.

Dharma - about his dog - http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/index.php?date=2010/06/05

The Country - about mice setting a house on fire - http://borderland.northernattitude.org/2007/01/05/the-country/

Another Reason I Don't Keep a Gun in the House - about his neighbor's dog - http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/another-reason-why-i-don-t-keep-a-gun-in-the-hou/

Introduction to Poetry - about poetry, funny enough - http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/001.html

From:

aidenfire

Oooh yes, Billy Collins is perfect! Thank you!

From: (Anonymous)

None of my immediate thoughts are running to anything teenager-appropriate. Oh! Wait! What about David Levithan's "The Realm of Possibility"? That might be more suited to reading throughout April, since it's book-length. I also like the Shel Silverstein idea. I'm trying to think of what poetry I liked in high school, and it was mostly things like T. S. Eliot for being all opaque and mystical, and Byron for being overwrought and gothic. Oh, and I loved "Snow White and the Seven Deadly Sins," but it would be of questionable appropriateness for early high school: http://deadlysins.com/features/snow.html Basically, nothing teenagers like is ever "appropriate" for them. :P

(As an aside, you should personally check out "Crush" by Richard Siken. As a non-poetry-reader, I do not recreationally read book-length poems, but this one was really good.)