Even as a child, I disliked most children\u2019s poetry. Dennis Lee\u2019s<\/a> Alligator Pie<\/em><\/a>, one of the bestselling Canadian books of all time, left me cold when I received it as a gift in Kindergarten (and it still does). Nonsense and doggerel were never my thing\u2014wistful, earnest child that I was.<\/p>\n But by late elementary school I\u2019d discovered Romantic and Imagist poetry. Thanks, Mom, for open access to your extensive home library! Whether that was a formative experience, or whether I was simply waiting for them all along, I\u2019m still partial to those styles. I swoon for poems that harness imagery to explore the depths of human experience.<\/p>\n When, as (very) occasionally happens, a children\u2019s poem comes along and hits all these buttons, it\u2019s a welcome reminder that not all poetry for children disrespectfully reduces childhood experiences into cheap and cheerful rhyme. The following three poems ripple through me every single time I read them. Still.<\/p>\n \u201cPeach\u201d by Rose Rauter has a powerful capacity to surprise. Every time I read it, I\u2019m struck by how insightful\u2014and accurate\u2014Rauter is to make these unexpected sensory connections.<\/p>\n Peach<\/strong><\/p>\n Touch it to your cheek and it\u2019s soft \u201cMy Mother Saw a Dancing Bear\u201d by Charles Causley <\/a>haunts me as mournfully now as it did when I first read it. The poem brings up unanswerable mysteries, like, why is the speaker describing his\/her mother\u2019s experience instead of a personal one? How could a maternal memory impact the child so intensely? But more to the point, this is a gritty introduction to the concept of animal rights, and I love the gravity of its philosophical stance. The sudden reversal in the poem, that shift from glee to horrified pity, is arresting. The imagery is so vivid. It gives me goose bumps every time. I have them right now.<\/p>\n My Mother Saw a Dancing Bear<\/strong><\/p>\n My mother saw a dancing bear And bruin lifted up its head They watched as for the Queen it died. And then, my mother said, there came They paid a penny for the dance, While it\u2019s doubtful enough that anybody\u2019s heard of the previous two poems, this last one is guaranteed to be unfamiliar: it\u2019s an (as yet) unpublished work by our own Katie Stobbart<\/a> (graduating English Honours student, English Students\u2019 Association<\/a> outgoing President, and Cascad<\/em><\/a>e outgoing Editor), completed in the Fall 2014 semester for my English 315 class.<\/p>\n \u201cUnder Aldergrove Lake\u201d uses complex, interconnected layers of imagery to conjure an extremely specific childhood moment. But the nuanced feeling Katie evokes will be recognizable to everyone who was one a thoughtful, yearning child. When I read this poem, I am instantly immersed in the strange, disorienting, beautiful, seeming inescapableness of childhood. Readers be warned . . .<\/p>\n Under Aldergrove Lake<\/strong><\/p>\n Buried under covers, I dream of sand * what is manmade?<\/p>\n Remember the wet, smooth cut<\/p>\n your pale arm<\/p>\n through the water, making green your eyes in. See the sunlight dim \u2014are you still there? mother calls, worried where is here? my pale face pressed<\/p>\n against the glass. *Due to the autoformatting of this blog template, line breaks in “Under Aldergrove Lake” do not appear as they were originally composed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Michelle Superle My Poetry Month Choices: “Peach,” “My Mother Saw a Dancing Bear,” and “Under Aldergrove Lake” Even as a child, I disliked most children\u2019s poetry. Dennis Lee\u2019s Alligator Pie, one of the bestselling Canadian books of all time, left me cold when I received it as a gift in Kindergarten (and it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":135,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131\/revisions\/135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Superle](\"http:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/english\/files\/2015\/04\/Superle-Headshot-Laughing-225x300.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n
\nAs a velvet newborn mouse
\nWho has to strive
\nTo be alive.
\nBite in. runny
\nHoney
\nBlooms on your tongue\u2014
\nAs if you\u2019ve bitten open
\nA whole hive.
\n~ Rose Rauter<\/p>\n
\nBy the schoolyard, a day in June.
\nThe keeper stood with chain and bar
\nAnd whistle-pipe, and played a tune.<\/p>\n
\nAnd lifted up its dusty feet,
\nAnd all the children laughed to see
\nIt caper in the summer heat.<\/p>\n
\nThey watched it march. They watched it halt.
\nThey heard the keeper as he cried,
\n\u2018Now, roly-poly! \u2018Somersault!\u2019<\/p>\n
\nThe keeper with a begging-cup,
\nThe bear with burning coat of fur,
\nShaming the laughter to a stop.<\/p>\n
\nBut what they saw was not the show;
\nOnly, in bruin\u2019s aching eyes,
\nFar-distant forests, and the snow.
\n~ Charles Causley<\/p>\n
\nits soft, coarse weight in one palm, then
\nthe other damp from the lake we made
\ncarrying buckets to fill this deep hole\u2014<\/p>\n
\nclear. Look into the mirror, dip<\/p>\n
\nand sounds slow to a single breath and a breath
\nLook up: the trees have gone still
\nas skyscrapers, the sky cobalt steel<\/p>\n
\nI\u2019ve gone too deep
\ninto that other world. Lift myself to the surface. Breathe again,
\nforget, and wake.<\/p>\n
\n~Katie Stobbart<\/p>\n