Happy Poem in Your Pocket Day!

The Brownies have a little saying about things in their pockets.

"I've got something in my pocket that belongs across my face.
I keep it very close to me in a most convenient place.
I bet you'd never guess it if you guessed a long, long time.
So I'll take it out and put it on. It's a great big Brownie smile."

A tad disturbing, no? You can imagine the jokes that the 5th grade boys would tell about it.

The Girl Scout motto is less disturbing, but I remember it just as well, I'm just not going to share it right now. I do, however, wish I had some Girl Scout Cookies in my pocket.

Here's one of my favorite poems by Marge Piercy, "A Work of Artifice." I use it in classes after reading Ibsen's A Doll's House. It's a perfect fit, really.

from "A Work of Artifice"

Every day as he
whittles back the branches
the gardener croons,
It is your nature
to be small and cozy,
domestic and weak;
how lucky, little tree,
to have a pot to grow in.

Topsy Turvy Falling in Love

Tomorrow is "Poem in Your Pocket Day." And yes, schools all over the country will be strongly encouraging their students to share poems...I've taken part in this pseudo-torture many times. But really, everyone is better for the experience. In honor of PiYPD, I'm going to share poems I like because they are fun and easy to get and modern and relatable.

Because I've always been a fan of dead white guy poetry, before I started teaching I rarely bought books of poetry by one person. I stuck to collections surrounding a theme or anthologies from my undergrad and grad years. Now, mainly thanks to gifts from my husband, I have loads of slim collections from various modern poets. It's pretty cool.

One of the first books of poetry I bought for myself was Nikki Giovanni's Love Poems. It is a wonderful collection of love poems broken up into various types of love. She has a poem to Tupac, poems to people who helped her in childhood, and of course lots of physical and emotional poems to lovers.

I've always thought "I Wrote a Good Omelet" was a fun and silly and simple poem that effectively illustrates what it's like to fall in love. You know, the kind of falling in love during which your friends, your job or school work, your family, eating, checking email all fall to the side because you just want to spend time with THAT person. Most of us have been there, no?

Here's a taste, and check out the poem with the link above. Love Poems would also make a great Mother's Day gift, so perhaps running out to your nearest independent bookstore to pick it up will solve some problems with what to buy.

from "I Wrote a Good Omelet"

I wrote a good omelet...and ate a hot poem...
after loving you

Buttoned my car...and drove my coat home...in the
rain...
after loving you

I goed on red...and stopped on green...floating
somewhere in between...
being here and being there...
after loving you