Midnight Poetry

Posted on 07/19/2023 by chick

I’m only just a few pages into Billy Collins’s Aimless Love: New and Selected Poems, but I’m already a huge fan. I loved one of the poems so much that I felt compelled to go downstairs in my PJs to read it to my husband. Now here, for your enjoyment, is an animated version of that poem.

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Reading Report: How Short Is Too Short?

Posted on 07/17/2023 by chick

Musical Tables by Billy Collins, no grade

I don’t grade collections of poetry, but I do occasionally comment on them. This one appealed to me because the poems were so short, most of them just a few lines long. It was, as you’d expect, a breeze to read. But some of the poems seemed, I dunno, sort of un-poem-y. I mean, how short can a poem be and still be considered a poem? Given so few words, how do you establish that it’s a poem and not merely a statement of thought?

I know what the poet himself thinks about short poems. Not only did he create this collection of them, but he also wrote in the afterword,

These days, whenever I pick up a new book of poems, I flip through the pages looking for small ones. Just as I might trust an abstract painter more if I new he or she could draw a credible chicken, I have faith in poets who can go short.

Small poems are drastic examples of poetry’s way of squeezing large content into tight spaces. Unlike haiku, the small poem has no rules except to be small. Its length, or lack of it, is its only formal requirement.

Afterword, from “Musical Tables” by Billy Collins

And I agree with him except to say that IMHO a poem has to evoke a mental image and an emotional reaction. It has to have the potential to make some quiet part of the reader’s brain suddenly jump up and say “Wait, what?” or “Oh, wow!” Here are two poems from the collection that did that for me.

A Memory

It came back to me
not in the way
a thing might be returned
to its rightful owner

but like dance music
traveling in the dark
from one end
of a lake to the other.
New Calendar

The poem of next year--
every week a line,
every month a stanza,

and a tiny sun
rising and setting
in every numbered square.

In these, I can hear distant music and imagine tiny suns rising and setting, feel nostalgia for a bygone time, and visualize a year as a poem, or a poem as a calendar. But many of the other poems in the collection struck me as plain thoughts, or even jokes. They were, I suspect, simply too short to get the images and/or emotions across.

So, I would say that the collection is hit-or-miss, but it’s worth reading not only for the hits, but also for thinking about why the hits hit and the misses miss. Perhaps there is such as thing as a “poetic bare minimum,” and if so, then Musical Tables is an exploration of it.

In any event, I enjoyed the hits enough that I have decided to read more poems by Billy Collins, and Aimless Love: New and Selected Poems is now on my reading list.

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Some Recent Things

Posted on 07/16/2023 by chick
  • I got my first shingles vaccine last month. The side-effects were limited to a sore arm (but way less sore than the first Covid shot) and mild body aches. I must remember to get a booster shot in 2-6 months (i.e., by the end of the year).
  • The landscaper came back with a really high number, so we had to scale back the project. We’ll still paying the guy a pretty penny, though, to pull out the old walkway, put in a new one, add a landing for the front door, regrade and reseed the yard, and add drainage for the downspouts. The work will be done in late August or early September. Meanwhile, it will be up to us to clear out the overgrown area along the side of the yard. We’re also researching water features, paths, patios, and plunge pools in anticipation of landscaping the backyard next year.
  • My eyes have gotten worse. My distance vision is still good (as corrected with glasses), but I’ve lost a line on the chart. The written word has gotten harder to read, particularly text on computer screens. I often feel bleary-eyed, and I’ve become so sensitive to the light of the computer screen that I sometimes have to squint to read it. I’ve started to make mistakes at work, misreading letters. Since I usually get a chance to catch my own mistakes, for now this only presents as a minor loss of speed, which no one but me is likely to notice. Eventually there could be real problems, though, and I’m doing my homework now to find out what my options are for the future.
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Reading Report: Enchanting Tale

Posted on 06/27/2023 by chick

The Grace of Wild Things by Heather Fawcett, A-

Grace is an orphan that nobody wants to adopt, so she runs away to a witch’s house and begs the witch to take her as an apprentice. The witch grudgingly makes an agreement with her: if Grace can perform 100 1/2 spells from the witch’s grimoire by the time the old cherry tree blooms again, then the witch will officially take Grace as an apprentice; if Grace fails, then the witch will take her magical powers. It’s a perilous pact, yet Grace loves living in the woods and going to the nearby school, and she soon makes friends who help her with her witchcraft. But can she master all of the spells, including the unfinished half-spell, by the deadline?

As described on the cover, “Inspired by Anne of Green Gables, this is a magical story of found family, loss, and the power of a girl’s imagination.” Every chapter begins with an excerpt from a poem about birds, which is a cute feature. The story seemed a little too twee at first, but it grew on me. Recommended.

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End of the School Year

Posted on 06/26/2023 by chick
  • Marshall’s 8th-grade graduation necessitated some frenzied shopping beforehand. Turns out the boy had holes in his shoes that he hadn’t bothered to mention. Bad enough that he went to school every day in those holey shoes, but he certainly didn’t need to parade them around in front of a gymnasium full of people. The only shoes he liked at the store were the ones just like his old ones, just one size bigger and minus the holes (the boy is very loyal to his fashion choices). So that’s what he got.
  • The graduation ceremony went well. Marshall won an award for math. His sister was, I think, genuinely and uncharacteristically impressed. But her competitive streak was also showing. She said, “When it’s my turn, I’m going to get at least three awards.” I’m going to hold her to that (not really, but it would be pretty cool if she managed to pull it off). Anyway, there were a lot of kids graduating, but not a lot of awards, so it was a big deal to win one, and I’m quite proud of Marshall. Plus, he likes math, and winning the award was just the sort of positive encouragement he needs.
  • Friday was the last day of school. Marshall wasn’t technically obligated to go, having officially graduated Thursday night, but he wanted to say good-bye to his teachers. Livia, on the other hand, ought to have gone but didn’t want to, since most of her friends weren’t going to be there. So, Marshall went to school and Livia stayed home, and everybody was happy.
  • Both kids did well on their report cards.
  • The kids didn’t miss the bus even once during the school year. Isn’t that something! We want to reward them. Not sure yet what form the reward will take. It has to be something big enough to match their commitment to getting up every day and out the door on time. Maybe a trip somewhere?
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Another Top 100 Children’s Books List

Posted on 06/26/2023 by chick

I have only 12 books left to read from the Top 100 Children’s Books list. Finishing the list will be a great accomplishment. But, in a way I’m not looking forward to it, because I will miss having a goal to work toward. My friend suggested that I choose another list to work on next, but the other lists I’ve seen haven’t been that appealing.

But then the BBC posted a new list of top 100 children’s books. It looks pretty good, and I’ve decided to go for it. I thought it would be cool for Livia (a.k.a. Luigi) to read the Top 100 Children’s Books while still a child, so I asked her to join me, and she agreed. Then my husband signed on. And Marshall (a.k.a. Mario) said he might read some of the books, too, once he finishes the series that he’s currently reading. So we’re going to try to read our way through the list together, starting from the bottom and working our way up roughly in order, skipping only the books that we’ve already read. School just ended on Friday, making this a great time to get started. No summer is complete without some good reading!

P.S. I’ve created a page for keeping track of my progress on this list.

Book TitleChickHubbyMarioLuigi
1. Where the Wild Things Are (Maurice Sendak, 1963)✔✔
2. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll, 1865)✔
3. Pippi Longstocking (Astrid Lindgren, 1945)✔
4. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, 1943)✔
5. The Hobbit (JRR Tolkien, 1937)✔✔
6. Northern Lights (AKA The Golden Compass) Philip Pullman, 1995)✔✔
7. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (CS Lewis, 1950)✔✔✔
8. Winnie-the-Pooh (AA Milne and EH Shepard, 1926)✔
9. Charlotte’s Web (EB White and Garth Williams, 1952)✔✔
10. Matilda (Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake, 1988)✔✔✔
11. Anne of Green Gables (LM Montgomery, 1908)✔
12. Fairy Tales (Hans Christian Andersen, 1827)
13. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (JK Rowling, 1997)✔✔✔
14. The Very Hungry Caterpillar (Eric Carle, 1969)✔✔✔✔
15. The Dark is Rising (Susan Cooper, 1973)✔
16. The Arrival (Shaun Tan, 2006)
17. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott, 1868)✔
18. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Roald Dahl, 1964)✔
19. Heidi (Johanna Spyri, 1880)✔
20. Goodnight Moon (Margaret Wise Brown and Clement Hurd, 1947)
21. The Adventures of Pinocchio (Carlo Collodi, 1883)
22. A Wizard of Earthsea (Ursula K Le Guin, 1968)✔
23. Moominland Midwinter (Tove Jansson, 1957)
24. I Want My Hat Back (Jon Klassen, 2011)✔✔✔✔
25. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett, 1911)✔
26. Duck, Death and the Tulip (Wolf Erlbruch, 2007)
27. The Brothers Lionheart (Astrid Lindgren, 1973)
28. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (JK Rowling, 1999)✔ø✔✔
29. Brown Girl Dreaming (Jacqueline Woodson, 2014)
30. The Three Robbers (Tomi Ungerer, 1961)
31. The Snowy Day (Ezra Jack Keats, 1962)
32. The Tiger Who Came to Tea (Judith Kerr, 1968)
33. Howl’s Moving Castle (Diana Wynne Jones, 1986)
34. A Wrinkle in Time (Madeleine L’Engle, 1962)✔✔
35. Watership Down (Richard Adams, 1972)✔✔
36. Tom’s Midnight Garden (Philippa Pearce, 1958)
37. Grimm’s Fairy Tales (Brothers Grimm, 1812)✔
38. The Tale of Peter Rabbit (Beatrix Potter, 1902)✔
39. The Railway Children (Edith Nesbit, 1906)
40. Noughts and Crosses (Malorie Blackman, 2001)
41. The BFG (Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake, 1982)✔✔
42. Rules of Summer (Shaun Tan, 2013)
43. Momo (Michael Ende, 1973)✔
44. The Story of Ferdinand (Munro Leaf and Robert Lawson, 1936)✔✔
45. The Lord of the Rings (JRR Tolkien, 1954)✔✔
46. The Owl Service (Alan Garner, 1967)
47. Ronia, the Robber’s Daughter (Astrid Lindgren, 1981)
48. The Neverending Story (Michael Ende, 1979)✔
49. The Panchatantra (Anonymous / folk, -200)
50. Treasure Island (Robert Louis Stevenson, 1883)✔
51. Mary Poppins (PL Travers, 1934)✔
52. Ballet Shoes (Noel Streafield, 1936)
53. So Much! (Trish Cooke and Helen Oxenbury, 1994)
54. We’re Going on a Bear Hunt (Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury, 1989)✔✔✔✔
55. The Adventures of Cipollino (Gianni Rodari, 1951)
56. The Giving Tree (Shel Silverstein, 1964)
57. The Gruffalo (Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler, 1999)
58. Julián Is a Mermaid (Jessica Love, 2018)
59. Comet in Moominland (Tove Jansson, 1946)✔
7/23		✔
6/23
60. Finn Family Moomintroll (Tove Jansson, 1948)
61. The Witches (Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake, 1983)✔✔
62. A Bear Called Paddington (Michael Bond, 1958)
63. The Wind in the Willows (Kenneth Grahame, 1908)✔
64. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry (Mildred D Taylor, 1977)✔
65. Karlsson-on-the-Roof (Astrid Lindgren, 1955)
66. The Phantom Tollbooth (Norton Juster and Jules Feiffer, 1961)✔
67. The Cat in the Hat (Dr Seuss, 1957)✔✔✔
68. The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane (Kate DiCamillo and Bagram Ibatoulline, 2006)✔
69. Peter and Wendy (JM Barrie, 1911)
70. One Thousand and One Nights (Anonymous / folk)
71. From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E Frankweiler (EL Konigsburg, 1967)✔✔
72. When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit (Judith Kerr, 1971)
73. Shum bola (G’afur G’ul?m, 1936)
74. Ernest and Celestine (Gabrielle Vincent, 1981)
75. A Kind of Spark (Elle McNicoll, 2020)
76. Little Nicholas (René Goscinny and Jean-Jacques Sempé, 1959)
77. Black Beauty (Anna Sewell, 1877)
78. Daddy-Long-Legs (Jean Webster, 1912) ✔
79. No Kiss for Mother (Tomi Ungerer, 1973)
80. My Family and Other Animals (Gerald Durrell, 1956)
81. Jacob Have I Loved (Katherine Paterson, 1980)
82. The Lorax (Dr Seuss, 1971)
83. Fairy Tales / The Tales of Mother Goose (Charles Perrault, 1697)
84. The Moomins and the Great Flood (Tove Jansson, 1945)
85. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (L Frank Baum, 1900)✔✔
86. Just William (Richmal Crompton, 1922)
87. The Twits (Roald Dahl and Quentin Blake, 1980)
88. The Mouse and His Child (Russell Hoban, 1967)
89. Out of My Mind (Sharon M Draper, 2010)
90. Moominvalley in November (Tove Jansson, 1970)
91. Little House in the Big Woods (Laura Ingalls Wilder, 1932)
92. Danny the Champion of the World (Roald Dahl, 1975)✔
93. The Snowman (Raymond Briggs, 1978)✔
8/23		✔✔✔
94. Wave (Suzy Lee, 2008)✔
8/23		✔✔✔
95. The Black Brothers (Lisa Tetzner, 1940)
96. The Velveteen Rabbit (Margery Williams, 1921)✔
6/23
97. The Bad Beginning (Lemony Snicket, 1999)✔
98. The Graveyard Book (Neil Gaiman, 2008)✔
99. American Born Chinese (Gene Luen Yang and Lark Pien, 2006)✔
100. Haroun and the Sea of Stories (Salman Rushdie, 1990)✔
7/23		✔
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Happenings Around Here

Posted on 06/12/2023 by chick
  • My sense of smell has been unreliable since Covid, so when I first noticed a strange, chemical smell on the air a couple of weeks ago, I convinced myself that it was just my imagination. Later that day, but husband insisted that it smelled smoky outside, and he looked online to see what might be causing it. It was smoke from Canadian wildfires. Since then, the wildfires have become big news, as they shrouded New York city in a toxic, orange haze and destroyed the air quality for much of the East Coast. But today, at least, the air quality wasn’t so bad, and I walked my full eight laps on the driveway, sans mask.
  • The Car Saga is over. We finally have all the car-related items that were promised to us, including the second key, the cargo net, and the title. The old car is sold and the plates canceled. My parents’ car is fixed and back in VT. So now I can relax and enjoy my new car. Except the car doesn’t feel like it belongs to me yet. It feels like a loaner. I hope that’s just a temporary feeling.
  • My husband and I wanted a buy a lake house, so we joined the housing fray for a few weeks. We went to an open house. We got preapproved for another mortgage. Then, after watching house after house sell within days, we began to wonder if there was any chance of us actually being able to both win a bid and afford it. What decided this issue was this one particular lake house in Massachusetts. It was priced within our range, and though it was a bit smaller than we wanted, it was otherwise perfect. I asked a realtor if we could see it. She said, “I can get you in, but offers are due the next day. There’s been a huge amount of interest in this property and there’s so much cash in this market, cash like we’ve never seen in this area before.” All that talk about cash was concerning, and I what I heard was, “Don’t bother.” So we didn’t bother, and then we quietly bowed out of the market. For now, anyway.
  • Stymied in our wishes to buy a lake house, we’ve pivoted to home improvement. This is, apparently, a national trend. Current homeowners are finding themselves unable to trade up, so they’re doubling down on their houses, spending big cashola to make their houses nicer. We had a landscaper out here last week. He recommends tackling the property in sections. First up is the front yard, which needs a new walkway, as well as landscaping along the edges of the yard. When I told the landscaper that I also wanted a walking path along the edge of the yard, he was like, “Wow, that’s weird. I’ve never heard of anything like that.” But I feel confidant that he can handle it. The guy seems like a pro, and I’m looking forward to seeing his plans.
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Reading Report: The Magician King

Posted on 05/27/2023 by chick

The Magician King by Lev Grossman, B+

I read The Magician King for three reasons: 1. I liked the first book in the series enough to want to continue reading about that fictional world, 2. I’ve been grooving on books with “magician” in the title lately (it’s a sort of reading theme for the year), and 3. I recently watched the TV adaptation of the series and enjoyed it.

While I also enjoyed reading The Magician King, I thought it was underdeveloped (spoilers ahead), which is especially noticeable when compared against the television adaptation. The main action of the novel–a quest to find the seven keys that are needed to keep magic from disappearing from the world–is handled better in the TV series. In the book, there’s a legend about the keys that is barely touched upon. The characters sail around randomly until they find the keys, only two of which require much effort to attain. In the TV series, there is a magical book that provides clues to finding the keys, each key requires its own mini quest, and each key has its own particular power. There’s a beautiful episode in which two characters grow old and die in their quest to find one of the keys. Kudos to the writers of the TV show for adding so much great detail.

The other focus of the novel is how one of the characters came into her magical powers and how her experiences, including a brutal rape, affected her. Her story in the TV show follows similar lines, but it too is handled better. In the book, the rape itself literally empowers her (i.e., gives her more magic). In the TV series, she earns the extra magic through her actions in the wake of that terrible experience. Big difference.

So, I expect that readers will find a lot that is interesting in The Magician King and be able to enjoy the book for that reason, while also feeling that it doesn’t quite live up to its potential. I will read the final book of the series (The Magician’s Land), but mostly to see how it differs from the TV show. As for the show, I recommend it to those who enjoy dark humor and don’t mind a little violence, gore, and debauchery.

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Reading Report: Cleary Twofer

Posted on 05/05/2023 by chick

Beezus and Ramona by Beverly Clearly, A: There are three Ramona books on the Top 100 Children’s Books list. This is not one of them, but it is the first book of the series. The main characters are Beatrice “Beezus” Quimby, age 9, and her little sister Ramona, age 4. Ramona’s a little bit of a trouble-maker, and the kind of trouble that she makes is often the kind that interferes with Beezus’s fun. Being younger, Ramona gets more attention, which is also hard on Beezus. I suppose this book must be pretty much required reading for girls with younger sisters, even if its message–“You’ll laugh about this when you’re older”–is unlikely to bring much comfort to youngsters dealing with troublesome siblings. Having never had a younger sibling myself, this book didn’t speak to me, but I thought it was cute. The cover of the books says, “Celebrate 60 years with Beverly Cleary.” The text, copyright 1955, is now approaching 70 years old. A lot about society has changed since its publication, but kids are still kids, and the book feels timeless rather than dated. Recommended.

Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary, A-: Ramona is now a kindergartner, and this story chronicles her age-appropriate misunderstandings and misadventures in a sweet and humorous way. Honestly, I enjoyed Beezus as a main character more (Ramona is very young and more difficult for an older reader such as myself to relate to), but at times I was reminded of my own childhood, both the good parts and the bad. Like Beezus and Ramona, this book has a timeless quality. Also recommended.

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SITY: Development

Posted on 05/04/2023 by chick

I’ve been keeping my eye on the Jack-in-the-pulpit plant. Since I took the previous picture, the plant has unfurled its leaves, and the flower has developed that classic Jack-in-the-pulpit “curl.” Isn’t it beautiful?

Jack-in-the-Pulpit
5/1/2023
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