Zapruder argues that the way we have been taught to read poetry is the very thing that prevents us from enjoying it. In lively, lilting prose, he shows us how that misunderstanding interferes with our direct experience of poetry and creates the sense of confusion or inadequacy that many of us feel when faced with it.   Zapruder explores what poems are, and how we can read them, so that we can, as Whitman wrote, “possess the origin of all poems,” without the aid of any teacher or expert. Most important, he asks how reading poetry can help us to lead our lives with greater meaning and purpose. Anchored in poetic analysis and steered through Zapruder’s personal experience of coming to the form, Why Poetry is engaging and conversational, even as it makes a passionate argument for the necessity of poetry in an age when information is constantly being mistaken for knowledge. While he provides a simple reading method for approaching poems and illuminates concepts like associative movement, metaphor, and negative capability, Zapruder explicitly confronts the obstacles that readers face when they encounter poetry to show us that poetry can be read, and enjoyed, by anyone.

    Filled with practical advice for the beginning and more advanced poet, this text enlivens students' understanding of poetry, illustrates poetic principles, and serves as a reliable handbook. It also includes an anthology of classic and contemporary poems, a springboard for classroom discussion and student writing. - A new section on Memory, in Chapter 6, shows students how they can draw upon their memories to write poems. - 70 new poems illustrate various poetic strategies to help inspire students own work. - This edition includes a greater emphasis on the revision process. These sections help students see poems as part of a process not merely products. - Quotation boxes have been integrated throughout the text. These brief quotations from experienced poets provide inspiration and illumination to the beginning student. - The section on Versification (in Chapter 3) has been clarified and simplified to help students better understand this complex topic. - Combines comprehensive instruction and a practical, student-friendly approach. - A wealth of writing exercises promp

    The medium of poetry is the human body: the column of air inside the chest, shaped into signifying sounds in the larynx and the mouth. In this sense, poetry is as physical or bodily an art as dancing.As Poet Laureate, Pinsky is one of America's best spokesmen for poetry. In this fascinating book, he explains how poets use the technology of poetry--its sounds--to create works of art that are performed in us when we read them aloud.He devotes brief, informative chapters to accent and duration, syntax and line, like and unlike sounds, blank and free verse. He cites examples from the work of fifty different poets--from Shakespeare, Donne, and Herbert to W. C. Williams, Frost, Elizabeth Bishop, C. K. Williams, Louise Gl�ck, and Frank Bidart.This ideal introductory volume belongs in the library of every poet and student of poetry.

    Katie Wood RayKatie (beloved author of About the Authors and Already Ready) begins with a strong, classroom-based research foundation for this powerful, intuitive idea. She then suggests 50 ways you might use illustrations to help students internalize key aspects of craft through their love of picture books.In Pictures and in Words is filled with sample student work that documents how children's thinking deepens as they explore illustrations. Katie even includes full-color pages of published illustrations with examples of sticky-notes that show the kinds of links students can make between pictures and words.Give children an engaging way to make the qualities of good writing part of everything they write, for life. Find out how Katie Ray can help you do it when you read In Pictures and In Words.

    The words you choose to describe your characters, scenes, settings, and ideas--in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction--need to precisely illustrate the vision you want to convey. Word Painting Revised Edition shows you how to color your canvas with descriptions that captivate readers. Inside, you'll learn how to:Develop your powers of observation to uncover rich, evocative descriptions.Discover and craft original and imaginative metaphors and similes.Effectively and accurately describe characters and settings.Weave description seamlessly through your stories, essays, and poems.You'll also find dozens of descriptive passages from master authors and poets--as well as more than one hundred exercises--to illuminate the process. Whether you are writing a novel or a poem, a memoir or an essay, Word Painting Revised Edition will guide you in the creation of your own literary masterpiece.

    Drout submerses listeners in poetry's past, present, and future, addressing such poets as Milton, Wordsworth, Shelley, and Keats, and explaining in simple terms what poetry is while following its development through the centuries.

    "But try to find words for the shades of a mottled sassafras leaf, or the reflectivity of a bay on an August morning, or the very beginnings of desire stirring in the gaze of someone looking right into your eyes . . ." Doty finds refuge in the sensory experience found in poems by Blake, Whitman, Bishop, and others. The Art of Description is an invaluable book by one of America's most revered writers and teachers.

    You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

    These essays illustrates Maxwell’s poetic philosophy, that the greatest verse arises from a harmony of mind and body, and that poetic forms originate in human necessities – breath, heartbeat, footstep, posture. He speaks of his inspirations, his models, and takes us inside the strange world of the Creative Writing Class, where four young hopefuls grapple with love, sex, cheap wine and hard work. With examples from canonical poets, this is a beautiful, accessible guide to the most ancient and sublime of the realms of literature.

    Priceless lessons, that only mistakes and sorrow can teach, leap out from the middle part of the book with the forethought to heal an inner wound that is still raw, still painful. This book of yearning, heartache and realisations gradually comes to a beautiful end in part three by unveiling how love is supposed to look like when it truly enters one’s life. By expressing some of the sweet feelings of falling in love and being consumed by it in this last section, with the right person this time, the aim of the book is one: to give hope to souls that propels them to the continuous search for Love. True Love. Throughout this book, loss, lessons and love have been portrayed in a brief, whimsical, poetic manner with meanings that are intensely deep.

    

    from "The House on the Hill" . . . from out of the fog, a large, welcoming house would emerge made out of invention and surprise. No things without ideas! you'd shout, and the doors would open, and the echoes would cascade down to the valleys and the faraway towns.

    Inundated with seemingly insurmountable piles of papers to read, respond to, and grade, many teachers often find themselves struggling to balance differentiated, individualized feedback with the one resource they are already overextended on--time.Flash Feedback seeks to alleviate these struggles by taking teachers to the next level of strategic feedback by sharing:How to craft effective, efficient, and more memorable feedback Strategies for scaffolding students through the meta-cognitive work necessary for real revision A plan for how to create a culture of feedback, including lessons for how to train students in meaningful peer response Downloadable online tools for teacher and student use

    Collections of interviews with notable modern writers

    But a house of her own, where she could truly take root, has eluded her. With this collection—spanning nearly three decades, and including never-before-published work—Cisneros has come home at last. Ranging from the private (her parents' loving and tempestuous marriage) to the political (a rallying cry for one woman's liberty in Sarajevo) to the literary (a tribute to Marguerite Duras), and written with her trademark sensitivity and honesty, these poignant, unforgettable pieces give us not only her most transformative memories but also a revelation of her artistic and intellectual influences. Here is an exuberant, deeply moving celebration of a life in writing lived to the fullest—an important milestone in a storied career.