My Poem
1992
LIZ HOWARD
This is our welfare half
a duplex with mint green
siding shrugged between
rail yard and main street
logging trucks and trains
shake the foundation so
much I mistake them for god
forever it is winter mom
dissolves into mentholated
smoke and Coffee-Mate at
the kitchen table painting
orcas and nor’easters in burnt
umber and verdigris until
the fuel we burn for heat
dissipates I find
my brother sitting
blue-tinged in his crib
mucus freezing to his
tiny upper lip come
spring he gets up on two
feet to press his left hand
onto her canvas leaves his
mark in the sky just over
where a suggestion
of light snuck out
through the rippled
storm cloud a copper
coin shining onto where
the waters calm at a
distance from the
anonymous
shore
Curricular Competency Reflection
I chose this poem to recite because I wanted a poem that conveyed some hidden meaning, in this poem there are subtleties that suggest that the writer was in a state of poverty when she had the experience behind the poem. Preparing to recite this poem was easiest when reciting it to other people, this was because it was the easiest to learn what to improve on when speaking my poem. I also prepared to recite this poem by reading it out loud and walking around so it stuck in my brain more. This was the best to me to memorize the parts of the poem I did.
Core Compentency Reflection
Examples of where I communicate clearly and purposefully can be seen in…
When I practiced speaking before hand so that when I presented the poem to the class my words were clear and I was collected.
In discussions and conversations, I help to build and extend understanding by…
When practicing and reciting my poem, I was able to help people improve upon speaking their poem and they helped me improve mine. This was beneficial and refining my speaking of my poem so that it sounded the best.
An example of where I built upon someone else’s ideas is…
When I was practicing reciting my poem, people helped my fine tune my poem and I built on their ideas to make my final recitation as good as possible.