Classroom Exemplars

So, I'm teaching a creative writing class this fall for sixth through eighth graders. I am starting with structured poetry, and for our first two forms, I pulled examples from the Internet, but also one of my own poems to show the class. I have written several haiku and limericks and posted a few here - so that was easy. But I haven't really written cinquains of my own. So last week, as I was prepping for my creative writing class, I came across the above pic of my son's cat, Pearl.. I decided to use it for my cinquain exemplar. Here are the two poems I wrote to show this style of poetry to my students:

Murder Kitty

 Kitten

Soft, small, fluff ball

Sneaking, pouncing, nabbing

Stop bringing me your killed critters

Icky

Kitten -

backyard trickster

waiting to nab babies

newly hatched, not yet weened, thought unseen.

Not cute.

One Year

 

One Year

It’s been one year

           since everything changed and

           my family will never be the same.

It’s been one year

           full of unanswered questions and grief

           with no signs of any kind of relief.

It’s been one year

           fighting constant pinpricks of tears,

           forced to face my worst fears.

It’s been one year

           of reexamining long-held beliefs,

           requiring a full memory debrief.

It’s been one year

           of perpetual physical and emotional pain,

           though therapies create slow gains.

It’s been one year

           focused on incremental healing

           pursuing authentic processing.