This week we were looking at Aracelis Girmay’s poem “On Kindness.” I would ask the students afterward to write a list of five abstract ideas (we would help each other brainstorm abstract ideas) and then pick one and think of examples of that idea before writing the poems. And here they are!
Mrs. Asvos
7th Grade, 2nd Period
“On Fleekness”
Dylan L.
Hair on fleek, jk
but my shoe game strong,
my outfit not really but still my shoe game.
“Living on Dumbness”
Penelope O.
You wake up and somehow your bra is off
You stumble to the bathroom and
sit on the toilet
oops
that’s not a toilet
You grab your toothpaste and you forget about
the toothbrush and you waste a perfect blob of
freshness. You lean and sway from sleep’s
capture. Ouch you hit your head on the door.
You go to your dresser and somehow you
close it on your finger. You head to the shower
Once you’ve turned the water off
and you think you are ready for new day you
trip over the tub and somehow
you scratch yourself. Great now there’s
water everywhere.
You repeat and repeat.
Great you are Living on Dumb.
“On Creativeness”
Tiffany T.
On street walls, lies art
in toddlers’ paintings, lies abstract
in the 3 R’s, lies reusing,
during science are science projects,
in paper, lies origami.
What do all these things
have in common you ask?
Creativeness.
Art could be anywhere,
street walls, canvases, paper.
Little boy Joe makes abstract with the doodles and swirls.
Anything can be up for reusing. Boxes, paper, shoes, and more.
Science teachers give projects. They can be about plants, hair, ice –
and much, much more.
Trees make paper, from paper makes origami. A simple paper turns
into nature, weapons, and animals.
This is the magic of creativeness.
Mrs. Asvos
7th Grade, 3rd Period
“On Love”
Kaylie P.
They took away his pen
they took away his journal
so his body became his
speech
(after the poem, Kaylie wrote, “it’s not a really good poem, it’s kinda about forbidden love I guess.”)
“On Truth”
Paul D.
Truth hurts more than words when
we expose words we just expose words,
but when we expose truth people change
from happy to sad, excited to worried.
Truth can’t be touched though they
are your action and the way you speak.
No one can alter truth, but you.
“On Space-Time Continuum”
Vincent M.
There, but not there
definitive, yet not defined
true, but it may be
false, utterly false.
The puzzle of the
universe, and all
other things,
space – time.
