Poetry Friday: Thanksgiving Rondeau

Welcome, all! It's my privilege and pleasure to host Poetry Friday this week. Seeing as it's the day after Thanksgiving, I'm particularly, well, thankful you've found time in your busy schedule to drop by.

As you may know, I've been working through the exercises in Stephen Fry's poetry book The Ode Less Travelled (highly recommended). I ought to be writing a Ballade this week, but I'm skipping ahead to the Rondeau because it seems well-suited to jolly holiday poems.
 

Thanksgiving Rondeau

We give our thanks for autumn sun,
for turkey smells and cinnamon.
With open arms, our friends we greet
and guide each to a comfy seat.
We drink a toast to everyone,

and now, at last, our feast’s begun.
For every drumstick, corn cob, bun,
and slice of pumpkin pie we eat,
we give our thanks.

And when our bellies weigh a ton,
and Dad can’t make another pun,
we stagger back onto our feet.
At last the yawning guests retreat.
For quiet house and chaos done,
we give our thanks.
 

OK, yeah, that's the Hallmark card version of the day's events. Just the same, I am deeply thankful to have shared a delicious Thanksgiving meal with friends and family (my father's puns and all). I hope you were able to find some joy and comfort in your own life this Thanksgiving and that those good feelings warm you into the winter.

If you would like to be included in this week's round-up, please leave a comment with a link to your contribution. I'll check in throughout the day and add you to the list below!

Original Poems

- Stacey at Two Writing Teachers shares "In One Year," a list poem inspired by The Aspiring Poet's Journal.

- Janet at Across the Page shares "Obituary for a Stranger," inspired by a tragedy last Thanksgiving.

- Schelle at Brand New Ending shares "Giving Thanks," written in Seussian anapestic tetrameter.

- Lorie Ann Grover shares a haiku, "Tea Flower."

- Anastasia Suen shares the story of her picture book poem, Subway.

Poems We Love

- HipWriterMama shares "Colors Passing Through Us," by Marge Piercy.

- Julie Larios shares "Starfish," by Eleanor Lerman.

- PoetLoverRebelSpy at Less Than a Shoestring shares "The Blindmen and the Elephant," by John Godfrey Saxe, illustrated with original photos from the Garden for the Blind in Bonn, Germany.

- Laura at Author Amok shares "Eliza's Jacket," by Calef Brown (one of my own favorite writers of poetry for children) and ideas for using it in the classroom.

- TadMack at Finding Wonderland shares "In memory of George Lewis, Great Jazzman," by Lou Lipsitz.

- Mary Lee at A Year of Reading shares "Grace," by Wendell Berry.

- Ruth shares "My Deliverer," by Rich Mullins and Mitch McVicker.

- Janet at The Write Sisters shares two poems by R. G. Vliet.

- David at The Excelsior File shares "anyone lived in a pretty how town," by e. e. cummings.

- Laura Salas shares "Michigan Sahara," by Lisa Westberg Peters.

- Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect shares "Thanks," by W. S. Merwin.

- Sherry at Semicolon Blog shares "The Prodigal Son," by James Weldon Johnson.

- Little Willow at Bildungsroman shares "November," by Elizabeth Stoddard.

- Sam Riddleburger shares a nasty poem by his young friend Sweet Daisy.

- The bloggers at PaperTigers share "Snow," a haiku by Sei Shonagon.

- Carol at Carol's Corner shares an anonymous poem, "A Thanksgiving Blessing."

- Anne Shirley shares "Avonlea," by Tammie Lynn Vaughn.

Poetry News & Reviews

- Sylvia at Poetry for Children shares information about Lee Bennett Hopkins, who recently received the NCTE Award for Excellence in Poetry for Children.

- David at The Excelsior File also reviews My Letter to the World, and Other Poems, a new Emily Dickinson collection.

- Cloudscome at A Wrung Sponge reviews When Louis Armstrong Taught Me Scat, by Muriel Harris Weinstein, illustrated by R. Gregory Christie.

- Karen Edmisten shares a list of poets for whom she is thankful.

- On the Just One More Book podcast, Andrea and Mark discuss Snow, by Cynthia Rylant.

Thanks for sharing, everyone!