Pencil Poem for Poetry Friday

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Hello and Happy Poetry Friday! Be sure to visit for Christie and Wondering and Wandering for Roundup, where there just might be a theme of trees!

Hmmm... does a pencil fit with the theme? Maybe? A little? :) Sorry I missed that memo, because I do love writing about trees! I look forward to reading everyone's offerings.

It's been HOT down here in the southlands... and I have been in a revision bubble, trying to get these novel edits accomplished and back to the editor... slow going. But good! Yes, I am feeling happy about my progress. And I've also got a new idea rattling around in my head, so that's kind of exhilarating... and I wrote a new poem, about a pencil! Read on!

For 2019 I'm running a year-long series on my blog in which I share my responses to the writing assignment prompts found in THE BUTTERLY HOURS by Patty Dann.

I welcome you to join me, if you like! I've divided the prompts by month, and the plan is to respond to 3 (or so) a week. For some of these I may write poems, for others prose. The important thing is to mine my memory. Who knows where this exploration will lead?

For links to the prompts I've written on so far this year, please click on The Butterfly Hours tab above.

This month's prompts are notebook, October, office, pajamas, paper, party, pencil, perfume, phone book, photograph, pictures.

PENCIL

My mind goes instantly to Mrs. Frizzle In the MAGIC TREE HOUSE books and the pencil in her hair! I did not encounter her until I had kids of my own, of course. Another adult memory is watching my mom use colored pencils to color in one of those beautiful adult coloring books while she was in the hospital recovering from knee replacement surgery. I did LOTS of coloring as a kid, and loved using colored pencils, because they are so much more precise than crayons...

Pencils also have been an important part of my musical life through the years... how many times have I watched a music teacher write something in pencil on the pieces I was learning? And now, as a cellist-in-training, I rely heavily on the pencil to help me note fingerings and to circle repeat signs and make conductors' corrections... one must be able to erase, because these things can change as you find new and better ways to make the sound you want (or the sound the conductor wants!).

Once I even wrote a picture book manuscript about a pencil! And here's a poem in the voice of a pencil:

photo by Aizhan Sagu - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=46335617

A (Simple) Message from Your Pencil

I am simple,

it's true –

I wear a slim yellow skirt,

one rubber boot

and a number 2 tattoo.

You can doodle with me,

scribble or print –

If you make a mistake,

I can take it . . .

and you can erase it!

I am simple,

it's true –

I am here

                  simply

to help you!

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- Irene Latham

Thank you so much for reading! xo

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