What the Boy Whispers to Animals—trinet poem

 Hello and Happy Poetry Friday! Be sure to visit Tricia at the Miss Rumphius Effect for Roundup.

This week I have a special treat! One of my favorite poet-librarians Mark A. Malcolm of Maynard Public Library (Massachusetts) has written a "Library" wordspinner inspired by Come In! Come In! Wordspinners to Welcome You Home.
Thank you, Mark!!!

Last week I aimed to write a trinet...but my poem had other ideas!

This week I aimed to write about an animal in the painting...but my poem had other ideas! It did, however, want to return to the trinet form. So off we went!

I learned about the (Georgia) artist Nellie Mae Rowe (1980-1982) from this Christie's article about women outsider artists. 

Side note: I recently published a chapbook about an (Alabama) woman outsider artist, The Whimsical World of Lois Wilson: Transforming Trash into Art, so I am delighted to meet Nellie!

I have several similar projects in queue...so much fun! 

Part of what appeals to me about these women is that their focus isn't fame or fortune; they create art as an expression of who they are. It's more of a calling.

Like Vincent van Gogh, their focus is on giving their gift to the world.

I, too, want to give my gift to the world...which is another way of saying: I simply want to be my most authentic self. Creating these little books is one way to do that! Thanks so much for reading.

What the Boy Whispers to Animals

You're irresistible!

I love

your shape, your voice, your scent.

Tell me more about your existence!

And then—

so sincere!—

he listens.

- Irene Latham

Praise Be, I Have a Mother Who Reads to Me poem

Hello and Happy Poetry Friday! Be sure to visit Carol at Beyond LiteracyLink for Roundup.

First, big shout-out to Nikki Grimes, who has just been named Young People's Poet Laureate 2027-28! What a tremendous honor, and I can't think of a more deserving poet. And, in true Nikki fashion, she's already got an amazing project ready to go: 

A POCKETFUL OF POETRY PROMPTS: 

TIPS FOR TEACHING VERSE

A Blog Created by Nikki Grimes 

2027-2028 Young People’s Poet Laureate 

Hooray! So many congratulations to Nikki on this outstanding accolade, on top of so many others!

Today's ArtSpeak: WOMEN features art by Mary Cassatt. Funny thing: I wanted this to be a trinet. But a trinet requires 7 lines, and I stopped at 6. I just felt like the poem was d-o-n-e. So it was better to let go of the trinet dream and let the poem be what it wanted to be!

Full-fledged trinets I've written:

Alabama Sunrise; Key West Sunset
A Dream of Rabbits
Trinet after an Argument

 And here's today's effort—a gratitude poem for my parents who read to me...and gratitude for all parents out there who read to their kids. It's important. Please keep doing it just as long as you can.

Praise Be, I Have a Mother Who Reads to Me

Half human,

half angel

she tucks me in a nest

of words, glorious words! I sing—

half bird,

half sky.

- Irene Latham

Lois Wilson + Yayoi Kusama = whimsical art!

 Hello and Happy Poetry Friday! Be sure to visit Linda at TeacherDance for Roundup.

Tomorrow I'll be at the Fayette Art Festival, sharing my micropress project, The Whimsical World of Lois Wilson: Transforming Trash into Art.

It's the story of Alabama outsider artist Lois Wilson (1905-1980) and her journey—from sharecropper beginnings to the trash piles of New York City and back to Fayette, Alabama, where 2,500 of her works are housed. Lois created art from discarded items: plastic lids, table legs, drawer parts, even a toilet seat! 

Anything can be art.

Meanwhile, today's ArtSpeak: WOMEN poem is after Yayoi Kusama's Mushrooms. Talk about whimsy! I think Lois and Yayoi are somewhere right now creating art together. 

I have previously shared poems after art by both these women:

When I Ride My Bike in Spring (Lois Wilson)

A Polkadot Poem (Yayoi Kusama)

Thanks so much for reading!

Forest Wake

moon or no moon
mushrooms pop their tents

while some of us sleep,
some of us keen

they work in determined silence

soon a campfire ring
blazes the trail—

                    drifters
dancing with the dead

- Irene Latham

Jubilee haiku poem from the Eastern Shore of the Mobile Bay (Alabama)

 Hello and Happy Poetry Friday! Be sure to visit Patricia at Reverie for Roundup.

Last week we visited Fairhope, Alabama, where I had a book signing at one of the loveliest indie bookstores on the planet: Page & Palette Books. It was so fun seeing dear friends and making new ones! (Shout-out to Pam & Tim, Julie, Anna, and Eric!) Also, this was my first event to show off Some Starry Night in its new "literary" jacket. 

Y'all, I've learned SO MUCH from this book! While I'll be bringing my 25th (!) book for children into the world come October, this is my first foray into adult fiction. Everything feels new. And we're in the age of AI. That means things are changing pretty much daily in how readers search for books. "Positioning" a title is more important than ever. 

Some Starry Night was first positioned as a "historical romance," and the cover was designed to attract those readers. But the readers who really love this book prefer literary fiction. And so...the book has been repositioned as literary fiction, which meant a "literary" treatment of the cover was required. It also made sense to rebrand the book in conjunction with the release of the audio version, so voilà! (Audio cover below...available NEXT WEEK!)

This week's ArtSpeak: WOMEN poem is also tied to my Fairhope trip. We rented a house on the Eastern Shore, right on the water. 

For years, I have heard stories about a natural phenomenon that happens in only two places in the world: Mobile Bay and Tokyo Bay. It's called a Jubilee. You can click here to read all about the science and specific weather patterns, temps, tides, and such that must be present to create a Jubilee. 

There are websites devoted to tracking such things, in hopes of giving folks some idea of when they might happen, but as you can imagine, unless you live there, it's super tough to plan for it and actually be there when it happens. (We live 4. 5 hours away!) So I'd pretty much abandoned any hope of ever seeing a Jubilee in person. (You see where I'm going with this!!)  

And then, Saturday morning, I got up early to take Rosie out, and we decided to walk out on the dock. No devices, just me and my dog and the morning. Y'all, the water was throbbing with thousands of fish! It was a Jubilee! And I was seeing it in person! By chance! Not having any thought of it at all! Talk about magical... and so, of course, today's poem is about the Jubilee. 

Art by Joan Mitchell. I had this piece saved in my file (titled "Low Water," and it feels perfect). Thanks so much for reading!