| Description: |
|
Product Description
This provocative collection of poems ranges from such lofty subjects as an astronaut’s view of Earth to the burrows of worms and little creatures within the earth, “where I try to tread softly: a quiet giant leaving only footprints on the roof.” Marilyn Singer’s lilting free verse offers visual images that give us fresh new insights and respect for the mighty power of volcanoes, fens, islands, deserts, dunes, and natural disasters. Singer’s easily accessible poems also include some of the lighter moments of childhood, such as sliding on ice and playing in mud. Meilo So’s distinctive india ink drawings on rice paper provide an especially handsome showcase for these buoyant nature poems.
Amazon.com Review
She treads gently over "mazy metropolises" of rabbits and worms. She chooses the ooze of mud. She contemplates "dormant dragons," natural disasters, and tadpoles born in the "sudden pools" of desert rain. Poet Marilyn Singer all but sings to the earth in this tribute to the wet, dry, hot, cold, messy natural places of the planet. Her free verse surprises the reader with its unexpected perspectives, and yet the images have a rightness to them that settles quietly in the heart. In "Back to Nature," Singer talks about how people want to be far away from humus moss and leaf mold, "from things soft and unpredictable / that slide beneath our feet," and yet even among our lampposts and sewers, nature returns, dropping mulberries "fat and purple" on the sidewalk, "turning the pavement soft and unpredictable / making it slide beneath our feet." Illustrator Meilo So's (The 20th-Century Children's Poetry Treasury) black-and-white India ink drawings on rice paper are breathtaking, as simple and complex as the poems themselves. Both Singer and So inspire the imagination with this lovely collection. (Ages 8 and older) --Emilie Coulter
|
