The Challenge of a Poem

I've been working to keep a sense of balance in my sometimes frenetic live.  One part of that has been tapping into "The Daily Challenge", a free website by MeYouHealth (challenge.meyouhealth.com) that has a variety of tracks ant daily challenges that you can participate in without any pressure.  It has a gamed based approach behind it with rewards, pacts, social connections and opportunities for action and reflection. 

I recently chose the "mindfulness" track because I need to start the school year living in mindfulness. This was today's challenge and my post.

Visit a website to find a poem that inspires you, and put it in a place where you'll see it often.

I remember having to memorize poems in 3rd grade. I actually loved it.
We memorized the first stanza of William Wordsworth, 1804 poem about daffodils

I notice that my 3 poems have to do with loneliness and inclusiveness. I think they are reflective of my spirit today. I am starting on a new school adventure - a new school start-up. We have 7 high school students. We had our first all school picnic and the kids shared their stories -- the common thread seemed to be not connecting in traditional learning environments. Thus these poems seemed to pop into my brain.

BUT the FIRST poem that popped into my brain was a welcoming poem by Shel Silverstein I used it as a bulletin board in my first classroom - inner city 8th graders. I still firmly believe that this poem (at the end) truly embraces my philosophy of learning.

I WANDERED lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay: 10
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed--and gazed--but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood, 20
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

 
The one that comes to mind (not from 3rd grade) is from Emily Dickinson

 I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us--don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!



and then:

“He drew a circle that shut me out-
Heretic , rebel, a thing to flout.
But love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle and took him In !

From the poem " Outwitted”

― Edwin Markham 


                        INVITATION by Shel Silverstein

If you are a dreamer, come in.
If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar,
A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic bean buyer . . .
If you're a pretender, come sit by my fire,
For we have some flax golden tales to spin.
Come in!
Come in! 





So for all of you working with learners of all ages and abilities --- I send you encouragement, invitations to play!!! Come in!!
Vicki