F is for Fragment

American Imagist poet Amy Lowell (1874-1925), who won the Pulitzer Price posthumously in 1926, assembled these creative phrasing to describe her own perception of poetry.

Fantastic!

Fragment, by Amy Lowell

What is poetry? Is it a mosaic
Of colored stones which curiously are wrought
Into a pattern? Rather glass that's taught
By patient labor any hue to take
And glowing with a sumptuous splendor, make
Beauty a thing of awe; where sunbeams caught,
Transmuted fall in sheaves of rainbows fraught
With storied meaning for religion's sake.

Last year's A to Z post: Flash Frozen

Related Items:

• Back to Square None?
• Beckoned Homeward - A Sonnet Scripted for the Sacred One
• Initial Ideas: A Brainstorm Acrostic

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Image/s:

Tree of Life

By Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933)

Public Domain Photo

A to Z Blogging Challenge 2012 logo

Fair Use

Favorite Classic Poems

Adapted from ClipArt ETC

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Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

March 2 is the birthday of the late great Dr. Seuss. Although this popular children’s author passed away more than 10 years ago, his award-winning works have taken on lives of their own in the hearts of many generations of readers.

How many of us remember reading our first words aloud from one of these titles?

• The Cat in the Hat
• Fox in Socks
• Go Dog Go
• Green Eggs and Ham
• The Grinch Who Stole Christmas
• Happy Birthday to You
• Hop on Pop
• Horton Hears a Who
• I Can Read with My Eyes Shut
• If I Ran the Circus
• If I Ran the Zoo
• Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You?
• Oh, the Places You’ll Go
• Oh, the Thinks You Can Think
• The Sneetches
• Yertle the Turtle
• You’re Only Old Once
• and many more.

 

What’s your favorite Dr. Seuss book of all?

And how about those favorite television specials, based on many of these books? Is Christmas TV viewing complete without The Grinch?

Dr. Seuss supposedly pronounced his name to rhyme with “poise,” rather than “puce.” However, for the sake of some Seussian fun on this literary legend for little folk, let’s go with the Anglicized version.

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

Happy birthday, Dr. Seuss.

What a world you did produce.

Rhyming comic on the loose,

You crafted humor most obtuse.

We love the tangled tales you spun –

Alliteration on the run

And words invented, just for fun

To teach us reading, one by one.

So thank you, Seuss, we miss you still.

We long for silly stories shrill

And whisper verses penned with skill

That twist and turn and tell and trill.

Today’s your day. We won’t forget.

We’ll weave a silly rhymed vignette.

We’ll tell a tale to show our debt

For appetite for words you’d whet.

c2012 by Linda Ann Nickerson

Theodor Seuss Geisel

(March 2, 1904 – September 24, 1991)

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Related Items:

• Creative Rhymed Baby Shower Invitation Wordings
• Great Grandfather: Rhymes in Time on a Grandpa Most Prime
• Jelly Bean Gospel: Easter Rhyme for Kids of All Ages
• Weavings and Believings: A Rhymed Affair on Tales We Share
• Whack-a-Mole: A Rhymed Raging Over Signs of Aging

Feel free to follow on GooglePlus and Twitter. You are also invited to join this writer's fan page, as well as the Chicago Etiquette Examiner, Madison Holidays Examiner, Equestrian Examiner and Madison Equestrian Examiner on Facebook.

Honoring his birthday, Dr. Seuss’ “The Lorax” opens this week. Have you seen the movie trailer yet?

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Dr. Seuss

Creative Commons Licensing Photos

Happy Birthday to You, by Dr. Seuss

Book Cover – Fair Use Photo

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A Snapshot Worth Remembering

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A Snapshot Worth Remembering

Photo c2009 by Nickers and Ink

All rights reserved

Romp in Circumstance

(An American Sandwich)

Flashing lights mimic insights

of late-night, last-minute exam reviews.

Proud elders and educators beam

with wonder, hope and disbelief.

They leave their high school days behind

with a joyous toss of mortarboard.

c2009 by Linda Ann Nickerson

Posted for a variety of prompts:

American Sandwich (3 lines, 51 syllables)

Easy Street Prompts (“remembering because we should)

Meme Express (“graduation”)

Just Jeering

Just Jeering:

What’s the view from the head of the class?

First Chair, Beware –

Limericked Peek at Class Oblique

Perhaps the pretty teacher’s pet,

Too petulant, yet never threat –

She led the class,

Jumped to surpass,

But was the first we might forget.

A century ago, she might

Have pleased instructors with delight,

But now it seems,

The stuff of dreams

Are young smart alecks impolite.

Posted for a variety of prompts:

Easy Street Prompts (““teacher’s pet”)

Friday Flash-55 (55 words)

Friday Funnies (humor)

Meme Express (Friday Freedom)

Simply Snickers (“jeer,” “jump” and “just”)

Weekend Wordsmith (“century)

Love poetry? Check out Simply Snickers, a brand-new weekly poetry prompt. Try your hand with weekly prompts! Or, look into The Meme Express for daily blogging prompts.

Click here to visit Linda Ann Nickerson’s poetry and humor blog, Nickers and Ink.

Throughout 2009, please join us at The Heart of a Ready Writer, a Bible reading and devotional blog, as we read through the entire Bible in chronological order.

Click here to subscribe to an RSS feed for this writer's helpful Helium content. If you wish, click here for a free subscription to this author's online AC content, so you won't miss a single post!

Preaching to the Mirror, Perhaps?

Posted for a variety of prompts:

Easy Street Prompts (“and then …”

Meme Express (“peculiar people”)

Simply Snickers (“sleep,” “sorry” and “sweet”)

Sunday Scribblings (“organic”)

That’s My Answer (“I Don’t Really Think I Can Manage . . . Today”)

Weekend Wordsmith (“pens”)

Word-Filled Wednesday (“rest”)

Writer’s Island (“Just Around the Corner”)

Preaching to the Mirror, Perhaps?

Inklings –

A Limericked Tear on a Poetry Rare

Mere ink on a page does not poetry make,

Though often we offer the self-same mistake.

In free verse or rhyme,

Our two cents will chime,

Unless we more effort and energy take.

 

So sorry indeed are the jottings so cheap,

Organic, but trite, scrawled while drifting to sleep –

Sweet longings confessed

But still not expressed,

Peculiar people and pens reaching deep.

 

We claim, “I can’t manage the verse. It’s too hard.”

But just ‘round the corner, a muse stands on guard.

The poet, distraught,

Then catches true thought,

While some of us settle to mimic the Bard.

 

We pray inspiration may blind us with light,

That inklings may overflow to our delight.

Poetic to wax,

We dare not relax,

But rewrite and edit with all of our might.

 

Fine wordsmithing builds in the depths of the heart,

As words coalesce into musical art.

With rhythm and poise,

So much more than noise,

A true poet beauty may ever impart.

 

Please take no offense by these barbs, if you will;

We preach to the mirror with homily shrill.

The longing of lore,

Creative rapport

Does drive us to dare require more of the quill.

 c2009 by Linda Ann Nickerson

Classics Class - a Teacher's Lament on Students' Descent

Let's take a peek in a present-day high school English class, from behind the teacher's desk. Are we dumbing-down literature and creative writing? What has happened to culture and literacy?

Classics Class

"Publish or perish!" the principal said.
Perhaps I would be better off left for dead.
My dreams, they are filled with inkblots of red,
And my editing pencil has run out of lead.

A sophomoric essay has caught me off-guard,
Comparing an MTV star to the Bard.
Old Will's reputation is suddenly marred
By teen disrespect and complete disregard.

Want to read more? Click here to read "Classics Class: A Teacher's Lament."

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