Some Days Are Diamonds

The kids and I started a poetry unit this week. First, we read poetry, ranging from Shel Silverstein to William Blake. Today we started writing our own.

The first poem we tried was a “Diamante.” Diamante poems are shaped like diamonds (hence the name) and have a very rigid structure.

The first and last lines are single words, nouns, that are either synonyms or antonyms. The second and next-to-last lines are each two adjectives that describe the nouns. The third and fifth line are three “ing” words that describe the nouns. The middle line is made of four words: the first two describe the first noun, and the second two the last.

I can’t resist. Like any proud mama would, I’m sharing our poems with you, as if this were my refrigerator door!

The first one is Girly Girl’s. She insisted on writing about Monster House. This one struggles a little with the structure because she used phrases for line three instead of single words. She couldn’t come up with “ing” words for “house” since houses don’t actively do anything. At least, not usually.

Monster House

by Girly Girl

House

old wooden

wearing out, feeling alone, depressing

Constance, haunted, frightening, threatening

eating, growling, lifting

scary angry

Monster

Because she struggled so over that third line, I had her try again, using something that does do things: in this case, people. This poem fits the structure but doesn’t quite fit the shape because her “ing” words were long and the words in the center line short. But I love the sentiment — and the title.

How to Take Care of Babies

by Girly Girl

baby

small short

nursing, sleeping, smearing

cry quiet loud comfort

breastfeeding changing rocking

big tall

mother

Oh, and just for the record? I did not influence her to include “breastfeeding” and “nursing.” Those words were all hers, straight from her brain. I probably did have some influence for them being in her brain in the first place though.

This next one is The Animator’s. It probably makes more sense if you’re familiar with Minecraft. This one isn’t a perfect diamond shape either, but I love the transition from “Steve” to creeper (never mind; it’s a Minecraft reference with no meaning anywhere else).

Night

by The Animator

Miner

Brave, Human

Hunting, Attacking, Building

tanned, good, evil, green

Destroying, Stalking, Haunting

monster, scary

creeper

And another of The Animator’s, also based on Minecraft. He’s all about Minecraft these days. He’s more than happy to do any writing assignment as long as he can write about Minecraft. I especially love the punchy ending to this one.

Dimensions

by The Animator

Nether,

Hot, Light

flaming, scaring, killing

underground, infinite, island, mid-air

killing, depressing, freezing

Dark, Cold

End

And yet another Minecraft poem. I particularly like the flow of this one. And the symmetry. Note the capitalization and parallelism in lines three and five.

Battle

by The Animator

Wither

Living, Black

Destroying, affecting, Killing

evil, sapping, giving, good

Healing, affecting, Protecting

Blue, inanimate

Beacon

Here’s a couple of mine. For the first, I couldn’t resist doing a pun on “diamante.” Mine isn’t a perfect diamond shape either because the second set of “ing” words were too long.

Diamond Diamante

by Katrina Stonoff

Coal

lightless, black

digging, burning, warming

cheap, abundant, rare, valuable

shining, glimmering, brightening

white, brilliant

diamond

This last one came about when I was helping Girly Girl with her “How to Take Care of Babies.” She just didn’t choose the words I would have! So frustrating. I realized I would just have to write my own.

Transformation

by Katrina Stonoff

Newborn

tiny, unfinished

crying, pooping, sleeping

helpless, needy, nurturing, capable

waking, diapering, crooning

fulfilled, grown

Mother

EDITED to change title and one word of one poem.