Nonetheless, this is the one day of the year when we can remember that weird and fantastical phase of falling in love.

I want share this little poem from my Salt collection I Sing of Bricks which came out just over a year ago. I wrote it because I had a beautiful pair of gloves, but then I lost one of them. What could be a sadder symbol than a single glove? Add this to the fact it was plum coloured and embroidered with beads and roses, and you will see why it’s a good subject for a little valentine conceit poem.

Glove

Because I love you, I offer you

this old glove.

Wait. Do not cast it

aside. It has held my hand.

Its soft felt embraced my fingers,

covered my palm.

Its partner is lost.

Take it to remind you, how you and I

could lose each other.

It fits me perfectly.

Keep it under your pillow.

Perhaps it will

reach for you in the night..

Its mother is wrong and its father is lies,
What makes it happy is no one knowing about it,
Its friend are called mean and unkind,
It lives in the mind and it lives in the soul,
It feeds on anger,lying and untruthfulness,
It wears nothing but lies,
It always fears that it might get broken,
What kills it well you wouldnt want to know..

.
( can you guess what emotion it is )

As you can imagine, I was delighted. I like the children to share their work with the group on the day but some are just too shy. I can empathise as I was rather shy when I was at school. I had been reading Komal’s work during the day and knew it was very good. So now she is sharing with a much wider audience.

Our class climbs into the massive orange spaceship

We’re all going to the moon today!

Mr Lavin says we can sing Happy Birthday

to our spaceship driver, Frank. We’re off! Yay!

The welcome centre is amazing! We are given

maps, jet packs, instructions, and are split into groups.

We set off into the ricky, bright, crater-filled landscape.

Stars are silver in the royal blue sky, boulders are red, yellow and indigo.

What’s that in front of us? It’s weird and it’s shouting

‘I want to eat you!’ Oh no, can our teacher save us?

Another alien, green with purple and blue spots, bounces up on a space hopper

and zaps the child-cruncher with its lazer finger.

It’s the end of our tour. Time for lunch and shopping.

We can go to MoonDonalds, Lunar King, Moon Pizzas or eat our packed lunches.

In the shop you can buy jelly aliens, flying saucers and haribou moon mix.

There’s alien rock and boxed astronauts. Buggies are good but too dear.

Our homeward trip is different. We’re all tired. We go

to sleep inside an egg, spinning back through strange skies,

watching a film of our wonderful day on the Moon. We land

near school, return to normal size. Our mums and dads are waiting

to take us home. We get our coats and bags, say thank you to the teachers.

This was the best trip ever!

To arrive at this poem, we decided on a topic incorporating as many ideas as possible, thought about how we could divide it up into groups and what order would make most sense. The groups came up with the ideas, fed it back to me and I drew it all together to show how to build up a poem.

What do I say to you, you who know me

and know what I am capable of ? I can give you

nothing I have not already offered but the desire

to keep on offering it, not asking for return.

It is not a petty bargain that we make, not a totting up

of meaningless figures, more a delight in the giving,

the hope of acceptance. My hand is open to you.

The years move along, crawling and running,

matching our work and rest, our sluggishness,

boredom, our moments of laughter and our silences.

The end of the century begins its slow approach.

Neither wants to be in this position when it comes

yet know we will look back to say, we were happy then,

we were young, we knew what desire was.

I have loved this strange surreal story from childhood, when it used to give me weird dreams but confirmed my faith in logic and being true to oneself. Arguing with over-sized caterpillars and chewing the fat with disappearing cats were regular occurences in my life.

The workshop took place on 22nd December. Great fun was had by all as we wrote alliterating nonsense poems to introduce ourselves, such as:

Creative Kitty tickles and teases kittens

Magnificent Milly gives loud applause at a perfect pantomime

Rosy Roxana munches mince pies

Amazing Angela time travels with Doctor Who

Nibbling Nick groans at grim cracker jokes

etc.

We read the mouse’s tail poem on a handout with a wonderful Alice border, then wrote a range of Christmas Shape poems and then shared our work.

Next we tackled a story inspired by a key and its label, and I guided them through a structure until the first secion was written. Some of the participants promised to email me their work so it may be posted on the DAN blog. If so I will post a link here.

Moving on from writing, we did some role drama based on The Jabberwocky, which strictly speaking is from Alice Through the Looking Glass, but it’s still Wonderland! We had great fun, particularly with the freeze frames to create the setting  ’twas brillig and the slithy toves/ did gyre and gimble in the wabe’.

Everyone went home with an ALice in Wonderland character note to write a story about their own encounter with it.  We all had fun, there was warm squash and a lot of laughter. And some good work was produced. Thanks everyone.

This is the first time I have sung in public accompanied by my husband on the piano, but I know that a few Christmas songs and carols would brek up the readings and be fun for the residents. They particularly enjiyed the readings about Christmas past, such as extracts from John Clare and Charles Dickens.

As part of the event, they wrote some lines for a group poem in the interval. Here is the group poem.

Christmas Is

The children’s smiles when opening their presents

A nice happy crowd who enjoy their food

All the lovely presents of chocolate

The shimmering tree

A good piece of pork on the table

Sitting and listening to Christmas songs

Having a glass of red wine

Remembering all the Christmas trips from school days

Christmas is a time to be happy and joyful.

(Group poem written by the residents and staff at Crossways, Lostock)

And a Christmas thought from Thelma

Christmas is a time for families when we all meet together to sing songs of praise and to honour the birth of Jesus.  We must all be grateful for everything we receive, be nice to our family and friends. We must think of everyone and about all the poor animals who need our help, especially at Christmas time when so many are cruelly abandoned.

‘After the Earthquake’ is included in a Geography textbook as an example of how it feels to be an earthquake victim.

‘The Butcher’s Shop’ is a set poem in the anthology Food Glorious Food set for English Language and Literature Advanced Level.

‘ How to Capture a Poem’ is included in a GCSE textbook.

‘The Athlete’s Dream’ was quoted on this year’s National Poetry Day poem cards.

Games_Postcards_A

Primary schools study my book The New Generation (Salt 2010) and a free teacher pack is available to any school which books me for readings or workshops.

I am on a ist of poets recommended by OCR for study practice for the Unseen poem, a feature of GCSE English Literature examinations.

My poems have also been used in connection with Oxfam, The Samaritans and by the Open University.

I have co-authored several GCSE textbooks for OUP, and written several focus books for Greenwich Exchange.

I am a Teachit key contributor and have uploaded many popular resources over the years.

This is the most recent one, written last week at Mill Lane Primary. The pupils suggested we make up our own mythical creature. I split the topic up into things like physical appearance, habitat, diet, behaviour and so on. THis is what they came up with in half an hour!

Death Door Dave, The Turtlejack

His head is a barking jackal with orange eyes.
The wet-noser has a turtle body,
a creature with wire wings and green blood;
wolverine-clawed, its scorpion tail is green-flamed.

Invivible he can be, or camouflaged,
breathing fire, water or air. If he knows
you are coming he lies in wait.
He can fly high or low, scary in the sky.

You cannot hear him come, you cannot hear him go,
you cannot hear him run from all the things he fears.
He may look like a blood-thirsty savage
but his heart is a baby’s touch.
Diaphonous smoke curls around him
with a reek of gloom and loneliness.

At night he steals dinosaur eggs, seasons them with fairy dust,
eats with a salad of brussel heads, lettuce and carrots.
By day he kidnaps humans to make friends
and wonders why he fears them.

Death Door Dave used to be a happiness thief
a life crusher, a human eater, a dream disintegrator.
That was before pest control put him in prison.
Now he’s a changed monster, vegetarian, wise.

He was first created in a meteorite accident,
the only one of his kind. Now he lives in
a groovy flat, a moose-head on the wall.
candles lit, a massive double bed, waiting for a mate.

Written by the group on Able Writers’ Day at Mill Lane Primary School, Thame, Oxford

Michelle McGraine has kindly featured my Salt chapook on her blog. Do check the link.

These group poems usually surprise me as well as the children! Over the next few posts I will be sharing some of them, partly so that the children can access them easily, but mostly because they are all good fun.

Here is one:

The Werewolf’s Year

In winter I don’t need a coat:
my teacher thinks I’m cool,
but if she knew what I could do…
When it snows I make a snow wolf
and my carol singing is a charm for the unwary.

In spring, I don’t like chocolate eggs.
I’d rather have a spring lamb, so juicy.
The forest is an inviting misty playground
with tasty little creatures all around.
The moon is a glittering crystal ball.

The long days of summer make me sleepy.
It’s my worst season. too hot for furry skin like mine.

In autumn, the harvest moon is a giant pumpkin.
For Hallowe’en, no-one notices my costume’s real.
That is until they start to scream when I howl.
The bonfires show my silhouette, so beautiful am I.
Brown leaves of autumn make me a cosy bed.

In all seasons I try to keep
what I am a secret from my friends.

Group Poem written by Able Writers at Winthorpe Primary School, Newark, Nottingham on 18 October 2011, led by Angela Topping