Poetry Friday: The Month of June

Still riding the year-end rapids, but I had to surface for this first Poetry Friday in the first month of summer.

June means graduation around here. The 8th graders at my school are graduating in a couple of weeks. They were kindergarteners when I first started at this job, so we've grown up together; now they're heading off into the wider world, and there are changes ahead for me, too.

This poem by Sharon Olds reminds me of them.

The Month of June: 13 1/2
by Sharon Olds

As our daughter approaches graduation and
puberty at the same time, at her
own, calm, deliberate, serious rate,
she begins to kick up her heels, jazz out her
hands, thrust out her hipbones, chant
I’m great! I’m great!

Read the rest of the poem here.

The Poetry Friday roundup, along with a lovely Elsa Beskow poem, is at Adventures in Daily Living this week.

Poetry Friday: Judith Viorst

Judith Viorst is usually thought of as a comic light-verse poet, but I found a lovely reflection on friendship today tucked in among the knock-knock jokes and kiddish complaints in her Sad Underwear and Other Complications: More Poems for Children and their Parents.

I'm lucky enough to have a few friendships like those portrayed in her poem Phyllis [poem removed due to copyright restrictions].