Picture Puzzle Piece

Hello Jessica here, this is a poem from one of my favourite poets. What does this poem make you wonder about?

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by Shel Silverstein

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One picture puzzle piece

Lyin' on the sidewalk,

One picture puzzle piece

Soakin' in the rain.

It might be a button of blue

On the coat of the woman

Who lived in a shoe.

It might be a magical bean,

Or a fold in the red

Velvet robe of a queen.

It might be the one little bite

Of the apple her stepmother

Gave to Snow White.

It might be the veil of a bride

Or a bottle with some evil genie inside.

It might be a small tuft of hair

On the big bouncy belly

Of Bobo the Bear.

It might be a bit of the cloak

Of the Witch of the West

As she melted to smoke.

It might be a shadowy trace

Of a tear that runs down an angel's face.

Nothing has more possibilities

Than one old wet picture puzzle piece.

The Tyger

No, it is not a typo...

The Tyger is a very powerful poem by Robert Blake. It is very well known for its vivid imagery. But hey, don't trust me, go read it.


The Tyger

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare sieze the fire?

And what shoulder, & what art.
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand? & what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And watered heaven with their tears,
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

~William Blake, 1794

Enjoy,
Jack Gao

Alone

Post by: Sarah Y
Personally, I love the works of Poe: mainly the way he plays with the English language. Here is one of his poems.

Alone

From childhood's hour I have not been
As others were; I have not seen
As others saw; I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I loved, I loved alone.
Then- in my childhood, in the dawn
Of a most stormy life- was drawn
From every depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still:
From the torrent, or the fountain,
From the red cliff of the mountain,
From the sun that round me rolled
In its autumn tint of gold,
From the lightning in the sky
As it passed me flying by,
From the thunder and the storm,
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view.

by Edgar Allan Poe

The Human Side of Reeds

Hi!
This is Charu, and I decided to post a poem by Rumi, the Sufi poet (1207-1273). I love his poetry because it is simple, soulful, and also makes you think about things in a new light.

If you liked Rumi's style, I definitely recommend listening to his poesy (I'm getting all fancy now) being performed- it brings more life and energy into the words.
Here it is:


A REED

A craftsman pulled a reed from the reed bed,
cut holes in it, and called it a human being.

Since then, it's been wailing a tender agony
of parting, never mentioning the skill
that gave it life as a flute.

-Jalaluddin Rumi
(Translated by Coleman Barks)

H20 (David's favourite sonnet)

A water bottle rolled across the floor
I pick it up and thought who is so kind
I tilt the bottle up and start to pour
And then I knew the bottle was not mine

A liquid blue, clear or brown and muddy
Salinity of water can change so
To wash or make your morning coffee
It always will have atoms H2O.

Located all around us every day
In rivers, lakes and oceans all alike
But comes a day when we all need to say
Conserve our water and save the northern pike.

Let’s keep our water flowing constantly.
So we can feel refreshed without a fee.

Echo

Hey, this is Angelina (again) and I know I just posted, but I really like this poem from Christina Rossetti, the same author that wrote "Goblin Market".

Echo
Come to me in the silence of the night;
Come in the speaking silence of a dream;
Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright
As sunlight on a stream;
Come back in tears,
O memory of hope, love of finished years.

O dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter-sweet,
Whose wakening should have been in Paradise,
Where souls brim-full of love abide and meet;
Where thirsting longing eyes
Watch the slow door
That opening, letting in, lets out no more.

Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live
My very life again though cold in death;
Come back to me in dreams, that I may give
Pulse for pulse, breath for breath:
Speak low, lean low,
As long ago, my love, how long ago.

--- Christina Rossetti

Double Bind

This is Angelina, and I just wanted to share this poem. It's pretty awesome. It was published in Young Voices 2005/2006, when the writer was 19.

Double Bind

She was never a writer, though the passions was strong
Desire to create bubbled inside her
Rushed through her veins
Lava that could never solidify
Could never be forged into anything
She tried her hand again and again
But the harder she gripped at words
The quicker they melted to nothing

She was never a writer, barely a poet
The few carefully crafted phrases
That had been born in her spirit
And gently welded in her mind
Died after birth on the page
But she clung to them all her life

And as she was never a writer, she became a cutter
Found in the knife the eloquence
That the pen never evoked for her
In simple, painful strokes the desire
Was finally cooled, and she found her peace
She wrote her memoirs in scars
And died with the tragic twisted truth
That as long as she was a cutter, she could never be a writer

--- Ann Beatty

Sonnet XVII

Hello! This is Amal and here is one of my favourite sonnets.

Sonnet XVII by Pablo Neruda

I don't love you as if you were the salt-rose, topaz
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as certain dark things are loved,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom and carries
hidden within itself the light of those flowers,
and thanks to your love, darkly in my body
lives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way because I don't know any other way of loving

but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.

Mr. G's very first post!

Hello to all students of Ms. Abrakasa's ENG2D7-C course! As promised, I have created this blog for you so that you might post one (or two) of your favourite poems here. Be sure to include the title of the poem and the author in your post. I would encourage you to read the poems that your classmates have posted and leave comments that might, eventually, turn into discussions about the poems posted. Since we will all be using the same user name it is important to leave your first and last name at the end of any comments that you leave for your classmates. I also encourage you to post your own, original poetry here as the comments that you might receive should prove to be an invaluable resource for the revision and inclusion of poems in your poetry anthology which is due on November 14th. Without further ado here is a poem to get everyone started:


We Real Cool

THE POOL PLAYERS.
SEVEN AT THE GOLDEN SHOVEL.

We real cool. We
Left school. We

Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We

Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We

Jazz June. We
Die soon.

-Gwendolyn Brooks