Reading & Writing Poetry Collections & Anthologies

 Happy Poetry Friday!  

  My poetry collection. 

Photo by Amy Soto

Today’s Poetry Break was inspired by Stephanie Afinito, from A Lit Life. She posed a question to her Get Lit (erate) Community.  Since it is Poetry Month, Stephanie asked members of the community to share some of their favorite poetry book recommendations. I got to thinking about my, rather large collection of poetry books (they are mostly children's poetry books).  I decided to share books that feature poems about reading and writing, a topic that is one of my very favorites!  My heartstrings are connected to these books.  If you are a book lover and writer, you're going to love this list. My curated list is in no particular order.

Amy has filled a book with a glorious collection of poems about reading!  Need I say more?  

Amy has done it again, this time she's collected poems about writing.  Perfection!  

Whether you love language, or you are a literacy educator, you will want to add this sweet anthology to your poetry collection.  As the subtitle suggests, there are poems about reading, writing, speaking, and listening.  

I love this anthology of library poetry!  It doesn't get any better than this for those who love spending time in libraries! 

I have consulted this often and always did so in preparation for National Poetry Month in my classroom and my school library.  According to my GoodReads review, I stated that every bibliophile, librarian, teacher, and reader should own a copy of this little anthology.  There are poem treasures to be discovered again and again.   

I used this poetry anthology so often in my school library, that I knew I needed my own copy!  

Book lovers, you are going to want a copy of Salas' collection of poems about books, reading, parts of the book, and more!  As a former reading specialist and librarian, I often shared the poems from this book with my students, as we learned various aspects of literacy.  

I hope that you will check out these wonderful books!  Happy Poetry Month!

Today's Poetry Friday round-up is being hosted by Margaret at Reflections on the Teache, where she has the Progressive Poem.  Stop on over for lots of poetry love.  

Book Cover credits: GoodReads

For more “Book Love,” follow me on:

GoodReads https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/10604107-amy-lynn

Instagram mother_goose_librarian

Until next time, Happy Reading and . . . I hope your heart strings connect with something wonderful you read!

4/11/22 #IMWAYR

 Happy Monday!  It's Monday, What Are You Reading? #IMWAYR

Middle Grade Must Reads:

Lately I’ve been diving into the backlist of books that I didn’t get around to reading when they were new or newer in the kidlit scene.  I’m currently finishing up The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill.  Looking at reviews of the book, I see that there are a large number of readers who thought the book was 5 star worthy.  I did see an occasional 3 star review. I am not ready to give it a rating at this time since I’m only about half way through but I can say that I am enjoying Barnhill’s writing style, world building, and character development.   

Picture Book Picks:

I’ve read some outstanding picture  books lately!  Here are two of my favorites.

Being that I am a “pug mom,” I preordered this book as soon as I saw it on social media.  Bug on the Rug, written by Sophia Gholz and illustrated by Susan Batori is a great read aloud with lots of fun word play!  Pug has made himself comfortable on the rug but then along comes bug, wanting to claim the rug for himself.  Pug and bug are in for a battle, until slug comes along to mediate.  So much to read in rhymes, about pug and bug’s battle for the rug!  Adorable and funny illustrations capture the reader’s heart and funny bone!  Bright and bold pictures work perfectly with the sparing text, to cohesively tell of pug and bug’s adventure on the rug!  Bug on the Rug has earned a special place on my, “picture books about pugs” shelf!  Read this book aloud and afterwards have a blast playing with rhyming words and word families.  This a great read aloud for pre-kindergarten through grade three.   

Poetry Break! 

(if you are not currently familiar with Poetry Breaks, check out my first blog, Mrs Merrill's Book Break, to read about them!  For #IMWAYR, a Poetry Break is a poetry book that I am reading and loving) 

I’m in love with this poetry/picture book, written by Eric Ode and illustrated by Jieting Chen. Stop that Poem! Is a poem that is constructed as the reader is taken on a whimsical journey throughout an ordinary day in an ordinary neighborhood.  A young girl wheels a wagon, full of words to a yard, where she stacks her words to make a poem.  Soon her words are carried away with the wind.  “Stop that poem!” the girl and her friend shout.  The words are scattered throughout the neighborhood and new lines in the poem are crafted at each scene; a pond, a clothesline, a tree, and other neighborhood locations.  The artwork has more muted background colors, with brighter pops of color in the foreground, that draws the reader into the illustrations.  Pair this poem picture book with word cards and a clothesline for children to craft and create their own original poems. This is the perfect read aloud for anytime but especially now, during National Poetry Month!

Until next time, Happy Reading and . . . I hope your heart strings connect with something wonderful you read!

Follow Me:

GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/10604107-amy-lynn

Instagram: @mother_goose_librarian

YouTube: Mother Goose Librarian

My previous blog: Mrs. Merrill's Book Break!

(Note: book images are linked from GoodReads)

Jen from  Teach Mentor Texts and Kellee and Ricki from Unleashing Readers are co-hosting the #IMWAYR blog hop.  Check out all the links to other blogs and see what great children's literature everyone is sharing; picture books, middle grade, and young adult.  

Collection

Me with a recent book purchase for a special collection.

Photo by Mark Soto

Poetry Ponderings

On Tuesday, I wrote a "Slice of Life" story called, My Bookish Book Collection.  It's a story about  the addition of a book for my collection of books about books, reading, and libraries.  As I reflected on this piece of writing, I began to wonder if I could turn it into a poem.  As always, my poems are works in progress, but I thought I'd share here.  

My Poem

Collection                                                                                                                                                          by Amy Soto

I have a special collection

of something I love -

books.

They line many shelves all through my house - books.

A  favorite, curated, compilation, stars treasured books about libraries, reading, books.

I have a special collection of something I love -  books.

After playing around with the lines, I thought maybe this could be a shape poem (you have to look at it sideways). What do you think? Does it qualify as a shape/concrete poem?

Some of my bookish bookshelves.

Photo by Amy Soto

Poetry Love

I always have a large TBR pile and have recently decided that my weekly reads must include poetry.  Now that I am not in the school library, I don't have the opportunity to share poetry with children on a regular basis.  I'm still thinking of ways that I can do so and will be sure to share here, on Poetry Friday, when I do.  In the meantime, I decided to ensure that I am at least reading poetry each week.  This week, my poetry reading is one of my new favorite anthologies.  

From my poetry collection.

Photo by Amy Soto

This week's Poetry Friday roundup is being hosted by Heidi at My Juicy Little Universe.