SLAMMIN' @ YOUR LIBRARY - Poetry for Teens
Abeel, Samantha. Reach For the Moon
Poetry, written by a girl with learning disabilities, reflects
her feelings and experiences. (YA 811.54)
Appelt, Kathi. Poems From Homeroom: A Writer's Place to
Start
Poems about the experiences of young people and a section with
information about how each poem was written to enable readers
to create their own original poems. (YA 811.54)
Believe Me, I Know:
Poetry and Photography
Poetry and photography from the San Francisco WritersCorp shows
perspectives of depression, hope, anger and racism. (YA 811.6)
Cool Salsa: Bilingual
Poems on Growing Up Latino in the United States
A collection that celebrates all the themes and moods of teen
life, and all the mixed traditions that come with growing up Hispanic
in America. (YA 811.54)
Earth-Shattering
Poems.
A collection of poems that capture intense experiences and emotions
by such authors as Sappho, John Keats, Emily Dickinson, Pablo
Neruda, Sharon Olds, and J. E. Wei. (YA 808.81)
Holbrook, Sara. Wham! It's a Poetry Jam: Discovering Performance
Poetry.
This guide to performing poetry alone and in groups includes guidelines
to set up poetry-performance contests. (j811.6)
I Feel a Little
Jumpy Around You: A Book of Her Poems & His Poems.
A collection of poems, by male and female authors, presented in
pairings that offer insight into how men and women look at the
world, both separately and together. (YA 808.81)
It's a Woman's World:
A Century of Women's Voices in Poetry.
Poetry by twentieth-century women from around the world including
Sylvia Plath, Nigar Hanim, Sonia Sanchez, and Nellie Wong. (YA
808.81)
Light-Gathering
Poems.
Poems of sunlight and starry skies, of light flickering in a dark
and difficult world. Whether about hope, beauty, comfort or healing,
this collection is filled with poems of light. (YA 808.81)
Paint Me Like I
Am: Teen Poems From WritersCorps
The diverse voices of teenagers everywhere. (YA 811.6)
Pierced by a Ray
of Sun: Poems About the Times We Feel Alone.
These poems, ranging from ancient to modern times and encompassing
several different cultures, focus on young people who have felt
misunderstood or alienated by an uncaring adult world, their communities,
or their time periods. (YA 808.81)
The Place My Words
are Looking For: What Poets Say About and Through Their Work
39 American poets share their poems, inspirations, thoughts, anecdotes,
and memories. (YA 811.008)
Poetry 180: A Turning
Back to Poetry
180 poems by the most exciting poets at work today, the perfect
anthology for poetry lovers who appreciate engaging, thoughtful
poems that are an immediate pleasure to read. (YA 811.6)
Poetry From A to
Z: A Guide for Young Writers.
This book, perfect for middle school students, encourages you
to give poetry a try. A variety of poems on subjects from autumn
to zebras are accompanied by suggestions for writing original
poems, in forms from acrostic to parody. (j808.1)
Seeing the Blue
Between: Advice and Inspiration for Young Poets
Several American poets offer advice to young people who are interested
in writing poetry. Examples of each poet's work will inspire you!
(j808.1)
Slam
"... not your average poetry book. It's your words, side
by side with the rants of the Beat poets, the verses of Shakespeare,
the rhymes of hip-hop, and much more." Find out what slam
poetry is and how to perform it. (YA 808.81)
The Spoken Word
Revolution: Slam, Hip-Hop, & the Poetry of a New Generation
Celebrates the works of a new generation of performance poets
that are taking the world by storm. (YA 811.6)
Things I Have to
Tell You: Poems and Writing by Teenage Girls
Poems, stories, and essays written by girls twelve to eighteen
years old, revealing the secrets which enabled them to overcome
the challenges they faced. (YA 810.8)
What Have You Lost?
An award-winning poet collected this anthology of more than 100
poems about loss, from simple things like a shoe or a game to
more provocative assets such as innocence or a homeland. (YA 808.81)
You Hear Me?: Poems
and Writing by Teenage Boys
Poems and essays by more than 50 teenage boys from across the
country as they ponder a range of emotions, their sense of identity,
and their struggles to make sense of the world. (YA 810.8)
Nonfiction in Poetry Form
Corrigan, Eireann. You Remind Me of You: A
Poetry Memoir
Eireann recounts her life-threatening struggle with anorexia and
then her boyfriend's suicide attempt through a series of intense
poems. (YA 616.852)
Turner, Ann Warren. Learning to Swim: A Memoir
A series of poems convey the feelings of a young girl whose sense
of joy and security at the family's summer house is shattered
when an older boy who lives nearby sexually abuses her. (YA 811.54)
Waniek, Marilyn Nelson. Carver: A Life in Poems
Award-winning poet Marilyn Nelson provides a look into the complex
life of George Washington Carver. (j921 C256ne)
Novels in Poetry Form
Cormier, Robert. Frenchtown
Summer
A series of vignettes in free verse in which the writer reminisces
about his life as a 12-year-old boy living in a small town during
the hot summer of 1938. (YA Fic)
Creech, Sharon. Love That Dog
A young boy, who comes to love poetry through a personal understanding
of what different famous poems mean to him, surprises himself
by writing his own inspired poem. (Juv Fic)
Glenn, Mel. Foreign Exchange: A Mystery in Poems
A series of poems reflect the thoughts of various people - town
residents young and old, teachers, and some students visiting
from the city - caught up in the events surrounding the murder
of a beautiful high school student who had recently moved to the
small lakeside community of Hudson Landing. (YA Fic M)
Glenn, Mel. Split Image: A Story in Poems
Poems reflect the thoughts and feelings of various people - students,
the librarian, parents, the principal, and others - about the
seemingly perfect Laura Li and her life inside and out of Tower
High School. (YA Fic)
Glenn, Mel. The Taking of Room 114: A Hostage Drama
in Poems
A series of poems reflect the thoughts of school officials, parents,
police, and especially a class of seniors who have been taken
hostage by their high school history teacher. (YA Fic M)
Glenn, Mel. Who Killed Mr. Chippendale? A Mystery in
Poems
Free verse poems describe the reactions of students, colleagues,
and others when a high school teacher is shot to death as the
school day begins. (YA Fic M)
Grimes, Nikki. Bronx Masquerade
While studying the Harlem Renaissance, students at a Bronx high
school read aloud poems they've written, revealing their innermost
thoughts and fears to their formerly clueless classmates. (YA
Fic)
Hesse, Karen. Out of the Dust
In a series of poems, 15-year-old Billie Jo relates the hardships
of living on her family's wheat farm in Oklahoma during the Dust
Bowl years of the Depression. (Juv Fic)
Hesse, Karen. Witness
A series of poems express the views of various people in a small
Vermont town, including young black and Jewish girls, during the
early 1920s when the Ku Klux Klan is trying to infiltrate the
town. (Juv Fic)
Johnson, Lindsay Lee. Soul Moon Soup
After her father leaves and Phoebe and her mother struggle to
survive in the city, Phoebe finally goes to the country to live
with her grandmother, where she learns family secrets and hopes
her mother will return for her. (YA Fic)
Koertge, Ron. The Brimstone Journals
In a series of short interconnected poems, students at a high
school nicknamed Brimstone reveal the violence existing and growing
in their lives. (YA Fic)
Rosenberg, Liz. 17: A Novel in Prose Poems
17-year-old Stephanie journeys from fall to spring and from childhood
to womanhood as she experiences first love and deals with her
fear of inheriting her mother's mental illness. (YA Fic)
Sones, Sonya. Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Big
Sister Went Crazy
A younger sister has a difficult time adjusting to life after
her older sister has a mental breakdown. (YA Fic)
Sones, Sonya. What My Mother Doesn't Know
Sophie describes her relationships with a series of boys as she
searches for Mr. Right. (YA Fic)
Testa, Maria. Becoming Joe DiMaggio
Joseph Paul was named after the baseball legend, holding all the
promises for a better life that Joe DiMaggio held for baseball.
(Juv Fic)
Wayland, April Halprin. Girl Coming in for a Landing
More than 100 poems tell of the ups and downs of one girl's school
year. (YA Fic)
Wild, Margaret. Jinx
With the help of her understanding mother and a close friend,
Jen eventually outgrows her nickname, Jinx, and deals with the
deaths of two boys with whom she had been involved. (YA Fic)
Wolff, Virginia Euwer. Make Lemonade
In order to earn money for college, 14-year-old LaVaughn babysits
for a teenage mother. (YA Fic)
Wolff, Virginia Euwer. True Believer
Living in the inner city amidst guns and poverty, 15-year-old
LaVaughn learns from old and new friends that life is what you
make it - an occasion to rise to. (YA Fic)
Woodson, Jacqueline. Locomotion
Lonnie writes a series of poems about his life after the death
of his parents, separated from his younger sister, living in a
foster home, and finding his voice at school. (Juv Fic)
Rylant, Cynthia. God Went to Beauty School
A novel in poems that reveal God's discovery of the wonders and
pains in the world He has created. (YA Fic)