#PoemPairs

 

The Leaf Detective: How Margaret Lowman Uncovered Secrets in the Rainforest

by Heather Lang

illustrated by Jana Christy

Boyds Mills & Kane/Calkins Creek, 2021

review copy provided by the publisher (thanks!)

FIRST THE PICTURE BOOK

The Leaf Detective is a picture book biography written in verse, lushly illustrated, and sprinkled throughout with quotes from Margaret Lowman and rainforest facts. Following the author's note (she's actually met and learned alongside Margaret Lowman in the Amazon rainforest in Peru), readers can learn more about the rainforest from a flip-the-book-vertically double-spread diagram of the levels of the rainforest, and explore further resources listed in the back matter. 

Lowman is a pioneer in the study of rainforests, and especially rainforest canopies. Not only did she invent new ways of studying the canopy by climbing into the tops of trees, but she broke through all kinds of challenges and barriers as a woman in the area of field biology in science. 

AND NOW THE POEMPAIR (replace he/his with she/her)

It Couldn't Be Done

by Edgar Guest 

Somebody said that it couldn’t be done,
  But he with a chuckle replied
That “maybe it couldn’t,” but he would be one
  Who wouldn’t say so till he’d tried.
So he buckled right in with the trace of a grin
  On his face. If he worried he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
  That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

Somebody scoffed: “Oh, you’ll never do that;
  At least no one ever has done it”;
But he took off his coat and he took off his hat,
  And the first thing we knew he’d begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
  Without any doubting or quiddit,
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
  That couldn’t be done, and he did it.

There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done,
  There are thousands to prophesy failure;
There are thousands to point out to you one by one,
  The dangers that wait to assail you.
But just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
  Just take off your coat and go to it;
Just start in to sing as you tackle the thing
  That “cannot be done,” and you’ll do it.

(this poem is in the public domain)

Inclusion and representation in science continue to be issues for women, and especially women of color. A video to share with students features Adania Flemming, a Black marine biologist/ichthyologist. Like Margaret Lowman, who has made education about women in science and about the rainforest important parts of all she does, Adania Flemming dreams of starting a research aquarium/museum in her home country of Trinidad and Tobago. 

NOTE: Thank you for your patience as we figure out the transition to WordPress. We will crosspost on A Year of Reading and A(nother) Year of Reading for a bit, but eventually, all current thinking will be at A(nother) Year of Reading. A Year of Reading will remain as a reference when we make the complete transition.

#PoemPairs

 

Birds: Explore their Extraordinary World

by Miranda Krestovnikoff 

illustrated by Angela Harding

Bloomsbury, 2020

review copy provided by the publisher (thanks!)

FIRST THE PICTURE BOOK

This is a gorgeous oversized nonfiction picture book. Illustrated with fine art linocuts, the information is grouped by types of birds, by notable characteristics (feathers, beaks and eyes), then by nests, migration, songs, and extremes (cold and urban living). Within each category there are big subcategories, and then each subcategory has short example sections. For example, in the category SEABIRDS are the two subcategories Seabirds of warmer waters and Seabirds of colder waters. In Seabirds of colder waters the reader learns about Gulls, Great black-backed gulls, Kittiwakes, and Gannets. This is a great book for browsing. You'll definitely be drawn in by the illustrations and then you'll find yourself perusing the bite-sized text chunks. The only thing that would make it better would be an index.

AND NOW THE POEMPAIR

Is it cheating to pair an entire book of poems? Bright Wings: An Illustrated Anthology of Poems About Birds, edited by Billy Collins and illustrated by David Allen Sibley is the most obvious pairing. Lots of fun poems plus gorgeous illustrations. 

If it's cheating to pair a whole book, I'll choose the poem Bird-Understander by Craig Arnold. This poem about someone who notices a bird trapped in the terminal of the airport; someone who notices the wrong in the world and who is desperate to help, to right the wrong. Birding requires close observation. There's much to learn about the natural history of birds if you bother to look closely, but just like in life, the closer you look, the more you are likely to see all kinds of problems that need work.

One of the problems connected to birding is racism. If you want to dig in more deeply, here is the story of Christian Cooper and a link to the (free) comic he wrote about what happened to him in Central Park when he was birding last spring.

A video to share with students features Corina Newsome, who broke stereotypes associated with becoming an environmentalist. She is a woman of color who grew up in an urban environment but became a zookeeper who has worked with turkey vultures as an Ambassador Animal Keeper at the Nashville Zoo.

Poetry Friday -- an unexpected #PoemPair

Learning Arabic

is more than just driving on the left in England.
It's driving on the left
with no cognates on the map,
an alphabet consisting of small bits of flowering vine,
and luckily a lay-by
where you abandon the car and the map
taking a path instead
walking like a botanist, field guide in hand,
poring over every blossom, every curving leaf,
breathless when you begin to find meaning
in this brand new ancient world.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2021

Yes, I'm learning Arabic with the DuoLingo app. Why? Because it's beautiful, it's hard, and my friend speaks it. 

I didn't think this would be a #PoemPairs post, but then I listened to today's episode of Poetry Unbound featuring "A special bilingual poem in Anishinaabemowin and English by Margaret Noodin, a linguist who writes primarily in Anishinaabemowin" and then the followup conversation between her and "Pádraig Ó Tuama, about the story behind that poem as well as the Anishinaabemowin language, translation, and the importance of language preservation." I was especially fascinated by the connections the two made between language and place, and between the Ojibwe and Irish languages.

So now, when I'm asked why I'm learning Arabic, I will add to my answer this new thinking from Margaret Noodin and Pádraig Ó Tuama: that language includes a connection to the land and to the soul of a place and its native speakers, and by learning this language, I will help to celebrate language diversity.

Carol has this week's Poet Friday roundup at Carol's Corner.

#PoemPairs

 

Hair Twins

by Raakhee Mirchandani

illustrated by Holly Hatam

Little, Brown and Company, 2021

review copy provided by the publisher (thanks!)

FIRST THE PICTURE BOOK

From the author's note:

"This story is a window into my family and our tradition, one that started over five hundred years ago in Punjab and that we are proud to maintain and make our own here in America."

This is also a story about love -- the love of a father and daughter that centers around hair and culture, ancient traditions and insider jokes ("hair cheers" and "hip cheers"). For readers looking in through the window of this story, there is information (coconut oil smoothed in for untangling) and vocabulary (papa's joora/bun, patka/bun covering, and turban). Woven throughout the story is joy, shared at the end with friends in the park.

AND NOW THE POEMPAIR

Pádraig Ó Tuama unpacked the poem "Coconut Oil" by Roshni Goyate on Poetry Unbound last week, and while it's not for children, the poem and his commentary are a perfect pairing for adult readers, especially those with "mainstream" (read white person) hair who will share Hair Twins with children and who need to continue to learn and understand how hair can be the source of racism and microaggressions.

For those who want to dig in deeper into the colonialism of beauty, check out this Code Switch podcast, or this PBS Newshour piece on "How hair discrimination impacts Black Americans in their personal lives and the workplace."