WHISPERshout Magazine Issue 1.25 out now! poems to light the dark nights

 

https://bit.ly/WHISPERshoutMag-CurrentIssue

This month’s issue features poems by 4th graders, all from the same class in a Title I school in Sacramento, CA. Each poem explores one or more kinds of light we humans use to light the dark, especially during the time of year when days are short and nights are long. In the Northern Hemisphere, that’s December.

Now that we’re halfway between the Winter Solstice (the shortest day of the year) and the Spring Equinox (when daylight hours equal nightdark hours) it’s nice to think that it’s getting brighter outside—even if it’s still cold! Enjoy....

(4th grade) poems to light the darkest nights

Greetings, Poetry People, from the squirmy seat of our nation's government. I left the first sessions of my Winter afterschool poetry workshops this week to find--hallelujah!--that it was not dark yet, and this tiny fact alone unleashed a bubble of optimism. Today I want to share a little story and some poems from a Teaching Artist project I did in December that, while related to those very longest, darkest nights of the year, is going to bring a bubble of optimistic light into your life right when you may be needing it the most!

Here's our poetry friend Patricia Franz and her niece, Anna Harris. (They look fancy and beautiful because they were at a family wedding last summer.) Anna is also Mrs. Harris, 4th grade teacher at a Title I school in Sacramento, CA. She was interested in doing more poetry with her students, and her Aunt Pat asked if I would be willing to talk with Anna. (As you know, Patricia is an accomplished poet herself, but wasn't sure about teaching poetry to kids. I believe she would have been QUITE helpful!)  I was willing, and in fact my first conversation with Anna turned into a whole 3-session workshop with Mrs. Harris and her class--my first over Zoom since I taught PreK on Zoom during the pandemic. (Yes, I was nervous; yes, there were glitches, and yes, we made it work across time zones.)

Anna's lovely, lively class of 20 kids includes many EMLs* and a number of kids still working towards 4th grade literacy skills, as you'd expect in a community challenged by low incomes. They were learning about winter holidays in many cultures and the role of lights, and to support their imagery, language and concept development, I asked Anna to prep for our sessions by having the kids make a related artwork of some kind. They did watercolor paintings featuring holiday lights, wintry weather (not necessarily Sacramento winter!) and night skies.

I brought in a collage and matching poem by me to establish that a poem is an artwork made of words; then we read bilingual poems by Francisco X. Alarcón to review how sensory details give a poem energy. We used Van Gogh's "Starry Night" for a collaborative writing warm-up, and as the workshop progressed, there was reading and sharing and acting out and a fire drill (all the classroom teachers say "OF COURSE!") and laughter and awkward breakout room tech and lightbulbs popping overhead and some magical moments like this one that Patricia described:  "I wish I had captured Ella’s DELIGHT when you read her poem. Her eyes were DANCING. She held her hands to her mouth as if in disbelief that this song coming from your mouth could be hers."

Oh, wait--did I mention that although Patricia does not live in Sacramento, she was actually THERE in Anna's classroom for one of the sessions? Yes! Aunt Pat visited her niece Mrs. Harris during the workshop week in December! It was just one of the many special things about this Teaching Artist project. I'm so grateful to Patricia, to Anna (whose own skilled art as a teacher was abundantly evident), and as always to the children, for being the reason I can muster resilience in a world that often feels too tough for tender me. All my bravery is on their behalf.

And without further ado...some poems and paintings by Mrs. Harris's 4th graders! (All will be featured in a WHISPERshout Magazine issue next week.)

Our host today is Tabatha the Brave, Tabatha the Broad, Tabatha the Deep, who shares her collection of poems by us about bravery for and in 2025. I'm always so grateful for her presence here and in the world. I didn't get my poem from a few years ago sent off in time, so I'll include it below and hope that's okay with everyone.  Be well and be bright!

*Emergent Multilingual Learners

tossing them out like confetti

Greetings, poetry people. Here's today's poem. I'm not holding myself to a new poem every single day--my one great wisdom as a writer over time has been understanding that, as an all-or-nothing type of person, demanding of myself that I do anything Every Single Day would lead eventually and directly to doing it not at all (including brushing my teeth; do not judge; I still have them all).    

Back to the poems, which I have been writing almost every day and posting--nay, tossing out like confetti onto the internet, usually on Instagram, sometimes on Facebook and sometimes on Bluesky (I left TwittX some time ago).  There's a certain madness in this--if I want to publish any of these in a journal, they are now "used goods" and not usually eligible for submission, but I've decided I don't care.  I'm sharing my wealth and celebrating with (biodegradable) confetti, like at a wedding, the marriage of my creative impulse and this day, neither of which are special or spectacular but which are what I have, what I am and what I can.  And since Nov. 6 in particular, I have trying to live according to this mashed-up advice from a reknowned UU minister and the tennis great Arthur Ashe:

~ love what you have, be who you are, do what you can ~

So here you go: have today's poem, in response to the Day 27 prompt from the MoSt New Year's Poetry Challenge which has been going on since mid-December. Coincidentally it is entitled "Purpose".

Do you follow me on IG? https://www.instagram.com/heidi_mordhorst_whispershout/

Are we friends on Facebook? https://www.facebook.com/heidi.mordhorst

Have you flown over to Bluesky? https://bsky.app/profile/heidimordhorst.bsky.social

And have you clicked to the right to follow me on Blogger after all these years? 🌞

Thanks to Kat Apel (well, hey there, friend!) for rounding us up today, and here's one last note of deep gratitude to the great Jimmy Carter, who with dignity and foresight chose the perfect moment to depart this mortal coil, reminding us all what public service in politics can look like.

age, trial, experience

Guys, I am really leaning into this "being enough" thing.

You can tell because I am the prompter of the Inklings monthly challenge again this January (we really should change that up), and I am recycling my prompt from last January! In some ways it's fair: I gave a choice of TWELVE prompts and most of us used just one, leaving plenty-eleven to choose from this year.

I myself, in keeping with this "being enough" thing, have selected the prompt that goes with our Yuletide gift of the human spirit for December 30, wisdom. We light the 10th candle, dark blue, and say, "Midnight blue is for wisdom, the understanding that comes with age, trial and experience."

I've gone for a golden shovel, and I guess I'm hoping that Himself won't read the blog this week. (If you do, DD, forgive me as I forgive you for making me the person I am today. **hugs!**)

Aging in Place


Long after midnight 

flashing red burns blaring over his blue. 

This is panic, not peace; it is 

no substitute for 

wisdom. 

His edges are blurred but not soft. The 

lengthy predawn texts bring understanding: 

that 

for some, more of the same comes 

with 

age, 

that what was always a trial is still a trial, 

and 

that some of us--bless--can't learn much from experience.

draft (c) HM 2025

Thanks to Mary Lee Hahn @ A(nother) Year of Reading for hosting us today, and go see what other gifts of the human spirit might be celebrated by our fellow Inklings this month!

Catherine Flynn @ Reading to the Core, who needs a bye this month 

Molly Hogan @ Nix the Comfort Zone

Linda Mitchell @ A Word Edgewise
Margaret Simon @ Reflections on the Teche

AND TO ALL A