“with a heart

Like an angel…

And songs in my belly

I have to sing…”

Choose this book and let your readers experience the connection between music and poetry, words and rhythm.  Young people may not know Bob Marley’s name but many will recognize his songs.

I AND I: BOB MARLEY by Tony Medina illustrated by Jesse Joshua Watson is bold, powerful and beautiful.  Bob Marley made his first guitar from a sardine can, a bamboo stick and electric wire; then he sang to the world about hope, never giving up, and keeping on …  “don’t worry, be happy.”  This book, written in verse, describes Marley’s life with the kind of poetry kids will want to read.

“My horse, fly like a bird, To carry me far….” The poems and songs in DANCING TEEPEES: Poems of the American Indian Youth selected by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve with art by Stephen Gammell have become a classic collection for young readers of poetry by American Indians.

A circle of teepees illustrate the first poem, “The Life of a Man Is a Circle,” and show a circle reflecting the seasons of  life. Simple, beautiful, thought-filled poetry:

… Our teepees were round like the                                          .                                                                                                      .

nests of the birds, and these were always set

in a circle, the nation’s hoop, a nest of many nests, .                                                                                 .

where the Great Spirit meant for us to hatch

our children.

Black Elk, Lakota Sioux

SOPA DE FRIJOLES/Bean Soup by Jorge Argueta and illustrated by Rafael Yockteng is a delicious bilingual dish – words in verse and a recipe. As a reader follows this young chef in his magical methods of making black bean soup, one might think about and maybe even write a poem about one’s own favorite dish.

Another bilingual book of poetry by Jorge Argueta, A MOVIE IN MY PILLOW/Una Película en mi Almohada, illustrated by Elizabeth Gomez, shows readers how one child connects memories of home in  two entirely different places – El Salvador and San Francisco.  In one magical poem – zinging with energy – a bike becomes a dragon of speed and daring that transports the most homesick rider – or reader.

A FULL MOON IS RISING by Marilyn Singer, illustrated by Julia Cairns, is a brand new collection and will be available just in time for this spring’s full moon in May. All poems are original and show readers a variety of ways people around the world celebrate full moon events.

ROOTS AND BLUES, A CELEBRATION by Arnold Adoff, paintings by R. Gregory Christie

Arnold Adoff, an American scholar of Black America blues and poets, sings words, taps out images, stumps and fiddles with ideas.   His new book of poetry is one to read and re-read:

Each Word A Hammer Hit. Each Word The Solid Tip

of finger hitting squarely on to the center of the ivory
yellow piano key. Each manner to each steel wire hit
makes tone  makes sound   and resonates:   rings like rocks
hitting calm water. C i r c l e s  of sounds   reach   out
like    circles    of words:    flow stories out from the shore.”

Find more about ROOTS AND BLUES HERE.

This nearly-classic collection is too good, too fun, not to mention.  Take a bee-bopping stroll under a canopy of poem trees just loaded with words, alliterating and spinning, even rap-rap-rapping.  The illustrations made of sewn-fabric collages are a delight to the eye.  The poetry stirs up toe-tapping images full of dreams, wishes (even of fishin’) and “just imagine!” what a poem can be.

AFRICAN ACROSTICS: A WORD IN EDGEWAYS by Avis Harley with photographs by Deborah Noyes

This collection offers a variety of verses that provide information in rhythm and rhyme.  Deborah Noyes’s photographs will make you sit down and look again.  Have you ever had an ostrich stare you in the eye and give fatherly advice in verse?  Open this book and select any poem for a read-aloud. You’ll smile while you learn something new and surprising. Additional information about these African beasts is tucked in the back of the book.

MY PEOPLE by Langston Hughes with photographs by Charles R. Smith Jr.

Thirty-three words. That’s the entire poem and book.  Photographs of faces capture the grit of the human heart – courage, delight, curiosity, pain and pleasure. Charles Smith states, “This book is a study in simplicity.”  It’s for all people of all ages to savor slowly, like a cool refreshing, drink on a hot summer afternoon.

THE TREE THAT TIME BUILT, A CELEBRATION OF NATURE, SCIENCE, AND IMAGINATION selected by Mary Ann Hoberman (US Children’s Poet Laureate) and Linda Winston, illustrated by Barbara Fortin. (Includes an audio CD with many poems read by the author.)

This collection celebrates nature.  The poems articulate the ideas of Darwin, echo the plea to “hurt no living thing” and encourage each reader to observe, ask, and wonder about both what is known and not known. Imagine reading side-by-side first a poem by D. H. Lawrence’s “Hummingbird” and then Rachel Field’s “Something Told the Wild Geese.”  This carefully selected collection offers poems that will delight, send shivers down the spines of the readers, and make them laugh out loud.