Salting the Ocean Review

Salting the Ocean: 100 Poems by Young Poets

Selected by Naomi Shihab Nye

Illustrated by Ashley Bryan

Bibliography

Nye, N.S. (Ed.). (2000). Salting the ocean: 100 poems by young poets. Greenwillow Books.

ISBN 0688161936

Summary

Naomi Shihab Nye was a writer-in-schools with the Texas Commission on the Arts for 25 years, going into schools throughout Texas, hosting poetry writing workshops with students. She has done similar events in schools across the country. Salting the Ocean is a collection of 100 poems written by the students in these programs that she saved throughout the years. She discusses the process of writing poetry and teaching it to students in her introductions. I found her Afterward particularly delightful, as she details the adventure of tracking down her students to seek permission for inclusion in this anthology. She found one person that fit a name but wasn't the student she was seeking. "The one I was talking to swore he had 'never ben invited to write a poem.' 'Why not?' he asked petulantly. 'Why didn't I get to write a poem?'" (105). I like that an adult is miffed that he missed an opportunity to write a poem in his youth. Nye also included little vignettes from her time as a writer-in-schools interspersed among the index. They are nice touches in a lovely book.

Analysis

Mostly this anthology of student work filled me with hope. I wasn't sure what to expect about the quality of the poetry, but I was very pleasantly surprised by the depth of feelings conveyed in the poetry as well as some sophisticated bits of imagery. Margo Bierwirth writes, "I met scardness in the park./ I found madness way high in a tree" (8). There is a bit of madness that is found when you've climbed the tree too high, and you're unsure whether you can make it back down again. Adam Delavan describes himself with comparisons of his body parts to other objects or animals, "The neatness of cats/ is in me./ In my hands./ That is me" (11). It's a good metaphor, evoking the quiet stillness of a cat full of potential energy. Rebecca Martinez has startling vivid metaphors in her poem Monday Night at Kwik-Wash, "Mrs. Dryer warm and soothing,/ Hugging and kissing my clothes" (52). In Whispers, Max H. Wier IV wields the assonance of "whisper" effectively through his poem, making the entire poem sound sibilant (98). Students will be delighted to see and hear these poems written by other students.

Highlighted Poem

I chose this poem by Joe DeLeon because I like the idea expressed in it (99).

Ode to Michelangelo's Bones

Many years ago

Michelangelo

Released men

From rocks.

Use

We will use the following poem by Pauline Alva as inspiration to write our own poems (15).

Monday Mornings

On Monday mornings I feel like

a miserable mouse, more miserable

than a monkey on Monday mornings.

On Monday mornings I feel like 

a miserable midget, more miserable 

than a glass of milk or a mommy.

On Monday mornings I feel like

a miserable millionaire, more miserable

than money, more miserable than

midnight.

Each different grade level will choose a different day of the week (Kinder = Monday; First = Tuesday; etc...). Then we will brainstorm alliterative words for how miserable we are based on their day. Then we will write a our alliterative poem.