In honor of Halloween, I’m sharing this poem from Something New Begins, an out of print Lilian Moore collection that Elaine Magliaro, I think, first recommended to me. Love, love, love this book!
This poem is originally from Moore’s collection, See My Lovely Poison Ivy.
The Witch’s Garden
In the witch’s
garden
the gate is open
wide.
"Come inside,"
says the
witch.
"Dears,
come inside.
No flowers
in my garden,
nothing mint-y
nothing chive-y.
Come inside,
come inside.
See my lovely
poison ivy."
–Lilian Moore, all rights reserved
Isn’t that fabulous? The witch saying, "Dears,/come inside," gives me the creeps!
I also wanted to share just a bit about our Poetry Friday panel at kidlit con 2010 last weekend! This presentation was the brainchild of Mary Lee Hahn of A Year in Reading–yay, Mary Lee! She emailed a bunch of poets/poetry lovers asking if we’d like to participate, and we ended up with five of us. Here we are meeting for breakfast at 6:30 on the morning of kidlit con.
Mary Ann Scheuer, Laura Purdie Salas, Mary Lee Hahn, Amy Ludwig Vanderwater, and Toby Speed
Huh. I’ve got to figure out the flash settings on my camera! Anyway, the five of us worked in an enthusiastic and somewhat haphazard manner (sort of like Poetry Friday itself) to hammer out the main topics we’d share and came up with a Powerpoint (again, thanks to Mary Lee, without whom this panel wouldn’t have happened at all).
While emailing back and forth, we acknowledged that we had no idea if we’d even have an audience or just be talking to ourselves. Well, the other session offered concurrently was canceled at the last minute. I felt bad that family issues kept the presenters from participating, but I admit to a guilty excitement that we could tell more people about Poetry Friday!
During the session, we talked about the history of PF, what we get out of it, how to participate in it, issues of copyright and trying to sell original poems that you’ve posted on a blog, poetry exercises in the blogosphere, and more. It was a lot of fun, and I’m hoping we got a few new participants!
Photo: Andrew Karre via Flickr (Is it kosher to share Flickr photos? I’ve never–gasp–used Flickr before)
Our Poetry Friday Powerpoint is public. Of course, you’re not hearing any of the discussion, but it’s got some good resources if you’re interested in looking at it or (hint, hint) passing it along to other people!
And the kidlit con recap will continue Monday. Like it or not.
The awesome Toby Speed of The Writer’s Armchair is hosting Poetry Friday today. Slither on over for some more hauntingly good poems.