Weekly Poetry Stretch

I am trying my pen at poetry these days and the blog, The Miss. Rumphius Effect, hosts a Poetry Stretch every week. This week the topic is poems about your favourite month. I have posted my poem below as well as on the host site, where you'll find some other fine musings on the months of the year. (seems that autumn is a popular time of year!)

Fall back
into leafy fire. 
Amber leaves against perfect saphire skies,
the patchwork forests
keep the darkening warm.
Bubbling over
joy
with just a dash of melancholy.

Kicking up the colours
floating 
to the earth
makes grieving summer easy.
Giving thanks
for cozy back to school sweaters.
A love affair with wool begins.
The giddy anticiaption
of fear
on the dark, laughing streets.

Earthy scents give way to 
visceral remembering
of rich soil
and harvests
not collected in a cart.

Crisp and content
is the fall
into 
October.


©2011, Sonya Wilson, all rights reserved

Alliteration Challenge

This week's Alliteration Challenge is being brought to you by the letter "P". If you want to join in, please leave your poem/story in the Comments box.

Pond Pearls

The bells pealed peaceably in the pueblo. Paul dipped his palm into the pond, lazily drifting in the pedalo. It was a perfect day for pearling. Pietra persisted in pestering Paul, pompously insisting that there were no pearls to be procured from the pond. Paul watched the peacocks peck at the dried up pease-pudding and peelings that had fallen to the ground from Peasant Pancho's market table. It was Peasant Pancho, a peddler, with a peculiar peaky look about him, who had pronounced that he had seen pearls in the pond.

Paul parked the pedalo and peeled off his peacoat. It was time to find the pearly pearls that lay hidden at the bottom of the pond. Paul peeked under rocks and peeled back the peaty bottom of the pond, finding only a peach pit and a few peanuts. As he clambered back upon the shore, feeling a little put out, Paul perceived a small polished pebble, looking remarkably pearl-like. He picked it up and after pondering it's pureness, proclaimed it to be the finest pearl-pebble in the province. Paul felt a glowing pride in his new position as a pioneer of pearl-pebbles and asked Peasant Pancho to join him in his newfound pursuit. As for Pietra? She partnered with Paul and Peasant Pancho and became a professional peddler of pearl-pebbles.

©2011 Sonya Wilson, all rights reserved

Alliteration Challenge

I do like the dictionary. Considering this, my vocabulary is not very extensive and I seem to have lost words since I've had kids. When my kids and I are sitting at the table at mealtime, and one of them asks me what a word means, I can usually use it in a sentence and I understand it's meaning but can't give them a definition. I reach for the dictionary, conveniently situated on a bookshelf beside the table, and announce, "it's dictionary time!" My daughter now asks, "what time is it mommy?" to which I usually respond with the actual time. She laughs and tells me that it's dictionary time!


Over the years, I have had fun with words by making up poems/stories of alliteration for cards, usually for my husband. A couple of great kids books we've read that use alliteration are "Bashful Bob and Doleful Dorinda" and "Rude Ramsay and the Roaring Radishes" by Margaret Atwood.

Here is my first story using alliteration, inspired by the pages that opened in the dictionary for me this morning (p.708 & 709, The Oxford Paperback Dictionary)

The Search and Salvage

Sarah, from the Salvation Army, wearing her Sam Browne belt, set off on a quest to secure a supply of samphire to savour in salads. She avoided the salvia, with its spikes of red flowers, which made her feel faint. She had run out of sal volatile, which she kept as a salve, for saving her from these spells.

The sandstone cliffs were daunting but Sarah, with her usual sang-froid, approached them in sandals. She had marvelled at the sandpipers scampering amongst the waves as she steered her sampan onto the sandy surface of the beach. Satisfied after a lunch of sandwiches and sangria, she proceeded to scale the sandstone wall that spread before her.

As she scrambled up the hill, sanguine about her quest, she stumbled upon a saluki. After raising a paw in salutation, the saluki supervised Sarah in sussing out the samphire she so desired. With samson-like strength, Sarah and the saluki, whose name was Sam, scrambled up the scarp and scree. In the last rays of sunlight, they saw it. A staggeringly salubrious sampling of samphire. Stupefied by its scent, Sarah opened an empty sandbag, and started securing a stockpile of the coveted plant.

She smiled at Sam and signaled her departure with a song of solidarity. The saluki joined in and their symmetry of sound stretched across the sea.

by Sonya ; )
©2011 Sonya Wilson, all rights reserved

Poetry Friday

I am a poetry newbie and thrilled to be standing on the edge of endless possibility. A number of years ago a  good friend gave us Shane Koyczan's book of poems, "Visiting Hours", for Christmas. I had never really looked at it but I pulled it out awhile ago and have fallen for his phrases of brilliance.

"Winner of the US Slam Poetry Championship and Canadian Spoken Word Olympics, he has been featured on BRAVO television, and NPR, BBC, CBC, and ABC (Australia) radio.

His first published collection, Visiting Hours, was the only work of poetry selected by both the Guardian and the Globe and Mail for their Best Books of the Year lists." - House of Parlance Media Inc.

I found a performance of his poem "We Are More" on Youtube and wanted to share it for this Poetry Friday, which is being hosted by The Family Bookshelf.  (he performed this poem at the opening of the 2010 Olympic Games). 


His book Visiting Hours was published in 2005 by House of Parlance Media Inc.

The Penderwicks

The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits and a Very Interesting Boy

Jeanne Birdsall

Published By: Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2005

We finished our adventure with The Penderwicks and are very excited to meet Jeanne Birdsall at Kidsbooks in Vancouver on May 16th! She will be showing off her latest installment in the Penderwick Series, The Penderwicks at Point Mouette. 

The suggested age for readers of these books is 9-12 year olds. We'll see how we do with the second and third book, as the sisters get older and their interest in boys grows, but I found that the first book was suitable for my 7 year old daughter and 10 year old son as a read aloud. There was something in it for both of them, although I think my daughter liked it better. They are used to the motherless children theme from Walt Disney movies and the eccentric professor of botany who often speaks in Latin is the perfect father figure for the boisterous Penderwick girls. He is very supportive but lets them have lots of room to explore life as he is busy with his own interests.

The Penderwick sisters range in age from 12 years to 4 years and are very close to each other, despite their differences. When they meet Jeffery, the son of the lady who is renting the summer house to the family, the adventures begin. Jeanne Birdsall brilliantly captures the emotional ups and downs of friendship, sibling relationships and coming to terms with disappointment at all ages. An award winning book that has the Wilson read-aloud seal of approval!