We have started a new poetry unit- we will be reading poetry, writing poems, and writing a literary essay about a self selected poem. This will be a reading and writing unit.  We started today with a poem by Ronald Wallace, titled: You can’t write a poem about McDonald’s.   It turns out that you can.

We read the poem together several times. One of the nice things about many poems is that they are comparatively short, so it is much easier to read them over and over. We began to look for sensory images in the poem, which we found, but the discussion quickly moved to the themes of privilege and surfeit found in the poem. Mallory commented on these ideas in her response to the poem, and several class members offered up evidence to support her thinking:

“All around me people are eating”

“As I reach for her,
she breaks into pieces
wrapped neat and packaged for take-out.”

“I’m thinking, how amazing it is
to live in this country, how easy
it is to be filled.”

“singing, my ear, my eye, my tongue
fat with the wonder
of this hungry world.”

It did not escape the group’s notice that the counter girl,  “crisp as a pickle,” “fingers thin as french fries,” “breaks into pieces.”  She is not participating in the plenty, but providing it.

After we responded to the poem, the final challenge was to choose another everyday object and write a poem about it which would hint at themes beyond the everyday. Some class members were willing to share their work with you.

Jude chose a similar familiar object to the mentor poem, but notice her vast difference in theme:

You can’t write a poem about food chain restaurants.
By Jude

On a Journey
hunger eating away my stomach
waiting to see something that soothes my

Rumbling hunger.
soon finding a place that I always know is everywhere.
I stop by it

not having to walk in or out
only having to reach out for the
Bag of fat Sugar and GREASE, of “food.”

tightly wrapped in the Simple Steps of a
chain restaurant

as I take a Bite of the thick Juicy
Monster of a chicken sandwich
feeling the salt of the crunchy pickles
the soft smooth architecture of the bun.
and the greasy taste of fried chicken.

and now I know I can always
rely on the restaurants that are
always their. getting every
last bit.

Mallory uses how one sees an envelope as a symbol for anticipation and fear.

You Can’t Write a Poem About an Envelope
by Mallory

I sit and the clock ticks faster than it should.
Fifteen minutes more.
I tap my foot.
I glow at the thought of a good answer
Five minutes
I glower at the thought of another.
Now. I run outside. I am scared.
I open the mailbox to the bright,
musty envelope.
I feel giddy at the sight of the white, sharpness.
I dpen it and the glower goes away.
No longer could it be a musty, sharp disapointment.
‘Tis only a bright, white happy envelope.
It could never be anything else.

Lila both holds and questions her perspective as an 11 year old.

You cant’ write a poem about 11 (but clearly you can)

I am 11
What does it really mean to be 11?
Well you might say Lila
all it is, is an age
Well what is age anyway
age doesn’t really matter
and yes I know that I sound
Like one of those Women’s Day
magazines, and some will say it sounds a bit gimmicky
but it is still true
I’ll still be the same person when
                                              I’m
twelve, and 13, and 14. Or will I?
So tell me, What does it truly mean to be 11?

Sam uses a common childhood experience as a metaphor for mastering fear.

You Can’t Write a Poem About Performing
by Sam

I step into the Chesterfield Town Center
mall, hand held tight in my fathers.
If only my heart was as steady.
I see people, young and old, walking in my
sure to be grave. I see a face I know!
Two! My heart flutters, but stops as I think
I see my mothers face bobbing in the sea of people, growing, growing, until
I’m close enough to touch- her. I sit
on the stool, the last performance
still in my ears. I begin to play, my
fear seeping away with each note. I
stop, applause shattering my fear, replacing
it with pride. I shakily step
down, the applause still going.

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