A Novel Approach to Poetry
Joyce Adams Burner, Curriculum Connections -- School Library Journal, 1/6/2009
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Listen to Margarita Engle introduce and read from The Surrender Tree
Do you get an adverse reaction to poetry from students who can’t get past its formal structure and mannered language? Instead of Yeats or Shakespeare, introduce them to a young adult novel written in verse. These titles, featuring perfectly distilled characters, contemporary and historical, will engage teen readers with their struggles and triumphs.
Portrayed in poetry, difficult subject matter is laid bare with spare, elegant language, and turbulent emotions are plumbed with poignance. Identical teen twins Kaeleigh and Raeanne alternate first-person free verse narratives of their family life, picture perfect on the outside but dangerously rotten within, in Ellen Hopkins’s Identical (S & S, 2008).
With Mom on the campaign trail, the girls chafe under the care of their father, a drug- and alcohol-addicted judge who molests Kaeleigh. Raeanne reacts by getting high on pot and acting out sexually, while Kaleigh shuts down, retreating into bulimia. Hopkins slowly ratchets up the tension, uncovering details of dysfunction that culminate in the searing revelation that Raeanne died eight years earlier in a car wrecked by her drunken dad. Language, both languid and precise, and the physical placement of text on the page contribute to Identical’s powerful depiction of Kaeleigh’s fractured persona. Work this title into discussions of eating disorders, abuse, family relationships, mental illness, and addiction.
As Linda Oatman High’s Planet Pregnancy (Front St, 2008) opens, Sahara, 16, is staring at a pregnancy test stick, “…holding my breath/because life/and death/and everything/in-between/depends/on a stick/dipped/for less than/ten seconds/in a dish/of pee.” Sahara hides her pregnancy, wavering between abortion and delivery until it’s too late to choose.
The author gives Sahara the authentic inner voice of a young girl who makes a mistake and is nearly overwhelmed by its consequences. Her growing maturity shows in small details woven into the intermittently rhyming, staccato verse, such as her gradual acceptance of the developing child, which she first refers to as “The Egg,” “The Fetus,” “The Kid,” and finally “my baby.” High avoids a tidy happy ending, opting to let Sahara’s continuing naïveté and lack of preparedness show even on the final page, making Planet Pregnancy useful in frank discussions regarding teen pregnancy and motherhood.
The concentration of carefully chosen words enhances the capacity of poetry to depict particularly intense emotions. Ava, 15, experiences grief for the first time in Lisa Schroeder’s I Heart You, You Haunt Me (S & S, 2008), when her boyfriend Jackson dies of a head injury after she dares him to dive into a pond. Ava senses Jackson’s ghost lingering in her house, turning on music, and appearing in her mirror. She can even smell him, and his presence holds her back from working through her grief and resuming her life.
Schroeder deftly portrays the intensity of teenage romance and the tenderness of fresh grief tinged by guilt in free verse narrated by Ava, as she first welcomes and then comes to resent Jackson’s company. “Jackson sits with me./He plays with the TV/from time to time,/making the channels turn./At first it makes me smile./Then it gets on my nerves./Big time./Because he can’t talk/like a normal guy./He can’t hold hands/like a normal guy./He can’t kiss like a normal guy./Unless it’s in my dreams.”
Libertad by Alma Fullerton (Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2008) tells the story of two young brothers living in the Guatemala City dump. When their mother is buried alive in an accident, the boys set off, crossing Mexico to seek their father, who is working in the United States. Despite the desperation and danger of their circumstances, a strong and brave spirit of ingenuity carries Libertad, seven, and his brother Julio, five, on their journey, based on the actual experiences of migrant children. Carrying a marimba salvaged from the dump, Libertad plays it on the streets to earn money for food.
Fullerton’s spare free verse distills the boys’ journey down to its dramatic core. “Sprawled in an alley/near the Alameda Central/of Mexico City/I find Julio,/beaten and bleeding./I pick him up/and carry him/two blocks to the/program center for help./I should have been/watching him,/but I wasn’t./It’s my fault./I am more/beaten/than Julio.” Put a young boy’s face on classroom discussions of immigration reform and social justice with Libertad.
The wars that marked the history of Cuba between 1850 and 1899 provide the setting for Margarita Engle’s The Surrender Tree (Holt, 2008). Free verse poems voiced by four characters trace the fight against Spain’s dominion. Rosa, a child with a gift for healing with plants and natural remedies, grows up to become a nurse who treats wounded liberation soldiers in makeshift hospitals set up in caves. She is assisted by her husband José and a young orphan girl named Silvia who escapes a prison camp. On the other side, Lieutenant Death is a hard man who dedicates his life to eliminating Rosa, “the witch.”
Engle’s haunting descriptions of bloody warfare waged against a lushly tropical backdrop are heightened by her carefully chosen words. Rosa observes, “When I travel/between two hospitals,/I listen to trees that speak/with the movement of leaves./The horse I ride/sings to me/by twitching his ears,/telling me how much/he hates/the flames of war./I stroke his mane/to let him know/that I will keep him safe./I hope it is true…” The Surrender Tree brings a seldom-explored period of Cuban history to life through eloquently expressed characterizations.
Marilyn Nelson’s extraordinary volume, The Freedom Business (Boyds Mills, 2008), juxtaposes an authentic slave narrative with luminous poetry written in response. First published in 1798, Venture Smith’s first-person account is reproduced on the left-hand pages, and Nelson’s poems appear on the right. Cool earth-tone illustrations by Deborah Dancy incorporating ink, watercolor, collage, and acrylic paint complement both texts with abstract images evocative of slavery. Venture, a young prince captured in Guinea, survived the trans-Atlantic journey to Rhode Island, and was sold to the first of a succession of masters. Eventually he was able to buy freedom for himself, his wife, children, and several others.
Nelson’s verse makes his story dance. “Just visited/a man I shall buy and set to work for me./I can make up my investment in six months,/even if I give him forty percent./I’ll hire him out at haying first. Good day./Let’s see: if I can talk his master down….” Pair The Freedom Business with Tom Feelings’s wordless The Middle Passage: White Ships/Black Cargo (Dial, 1995) for a provocative, visceral portrayal of slavery for high school students.
Novels written in verse combine the strengths of great character development and gripping plot with the impact of perfectly succinct word choice, the text arranged precisely on the page to heighten the impact of the language. Introduce poetry-shy students to these engaging characters, depicted through the details of their compelling stories.
Listen to Margarita Engle introduce and read from The Surrender Tree
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