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Viking Ship [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. A couple of weeks ago, Randy and I attended the Youth in Music marching band show at the new Vikings stadium downtown. (Awesome show, but what’s with no
Freighter Drama [Slice of Life Tuesday]
For my birthday, my husband and I spent several days in Duluth, a harbor city at the southern edge of Lake Superior. We love Duluth, and one of our favorite things is watching ships come and go from the harbor–especially the 1,000-footers. There are 14 or so of them that travel the Great Lakes, hauling
Window [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. [Also, subscribers, did you get an email notification this morning that this post was up? I didn’t, and I’m wondering if there’s a glitch.] Although I don’t like
Mushroom [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. I was walking Jack the other day and came across this one small mushroom in a huge open field that’s part of a park near my house. With
Words Live [Slice of Life Tuesday]
A couple of weeks ago, I came home to a box on my doorstep from Lerner. I thought it might be my author copies of my next picture book, even though that’s still 5 months from publication. I ran into the kitchen and tore open the box. Nope. Not If You Were the Moon. Instead,
Ekphrastic Poems with the Poetry Princesses [Poetry Friday]
Happy October, poetry friends. I love autumn, and I’m actually enjoying, kind of, the ongoing process of unpacking and settling in. And my writing has gotten back on track, too. I wrote all summer, but it was a frantic, meet-the-deadline-while-doing-a-million-other-things kind of writing. I’m still too busy, but it’s my normal kind of too busy.
Horse [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. There’s a cool metal horse sculpture at the Anderson Center in Red Wing, MN, where I was at the Minnesota Children’s Book Festival recently. The light was harsh,
Tennis [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. I was downtown in Minneapolis a few weeks ago having a food truck lunch with Randy, and the annual tennis tourney was going–in front of a skyscraper, at
Poems by Young Writers at the Minnesota Children’s Book Festival
On Saturday, the 17th, I spent the day in Red Wing, MN, at the Anderson Center for the Minnesota Children’s Book Festival. Lisa Bullard and I both manned the So You Want to Be an Author tent. We spent the buggy afternoon talking with adults who want to write for kids and also writing poems
How My Monarch Poem Emerged [Poetry Friday]
Happy Poetry Friday! (Wondering what Poetry Friday is? Click here.) A couple of weeks ago, I shared that my Poetry Princesses poem of the month was written on an airplane as I flew from Minneapolis to Orlando. Today, I thought I’d share the notebook pages of the drafts. I started out with my rhyming words,
Tower [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. I took this picture at a drum corps rehearsal over the summer, and it makes me think of several things:
Happy Birthday, Maddie!
It’s our daughter Maddie’s 21st birthday today, and I want to share a poem again that I wrote a couple of years ago, when she was first heading overseas to learn about missions work. A few weeks ago, we once again made the teary airport trek to say goodbye. But during her month at home,
Goodbye to Summer, Hello to Fall [Poetry Friday]
Happy Poetry Friday! (Wondering what Poetry Friday is? Click here.) Since yesterday’s 15 Words or Less post was about the Hello/Goodbye doormat, I thought I’d share my “Goodbye, Hello!” poem again, which I was proud to have appear in Highlights last year: Goodbye, Hello! Goodbye, blue sky Hello, walls Goodbye, sidewalks Hello, halls
Hello [15 Words or Less Poems]
Hello, and welcome! This is 15 Words or Less Poems, a low-pressure way to wake up your poetry brain (guidelines here), and I’m very glad you’re here. Thank you for continuing to tune in over the summer and participate, even though I’ve been largely absent. That has meant a lot to me. This is the
Clogyrnachs with the Poetry Princesses [Poetry Friday]
Happy September, poetry friends. Last month, I had to sit out from the Poetry Princesses 1st-Friday-of-the-month posting. This month, although I’m not bringing much to the table, I did at least write a poem. I wrote it on the plane ride down to Florida, where I’m spending a bit of time helping my dad with
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Are You Looking For?
Go to my Poetry page for:
- National Poetry Month projects through the years
- Small Reads Roundups (poems grouped by topic)
- Introductions to several favorite poetry forms