High School Students and Poetry, More Top Five Lists, and Tornado Tragedy

First of all, my heart goes out to all who were affected by massive tornadoes that swept across the south several days ago. Hundreds of people were killed, thousands impacted through destroyed homes. When I lived in Tennessee, the night of my oldest brother’s high school graduation, a small funnel cloud went through out front yard. I experienced several tornadoes while living in Cincinnati, once while I was babysitting two young children, and another that tore the front wall out of my gym, hit my former high school, and killed the parents of a fellow high school student by literally lifting them out of their second-story bedroom while they slept. As you might imagine, I had nightmares about tornadoes for a decade after I left the midwest. (I lived in Richmond when they were hit by a hurricane and some flooding, but somehow, it didn’t seem as scary as those tornadoes…) Although, I’m heading up to Skagit this weekend for the tulip festival/my birthday celebration, and they say a funnel cloud was spotted there yesterday! I’m hoping for better weather the next few days…just a little sunshine, please!!

I had the opportunity to judge a poetry contest for high school students and got to meet the winners at this little reading/award ceremony. It was really fun to meet the students who won and hear them read their poems, and see their proud parents sitting in the audience and clapping for them. I have to say these kinds of events really inspire me and help me to love poetry again. If you really feel too depressed about poetry, go work with some high school kids – it always reminds me of the reasons I fell in love with poetry to begin with.

Thanks to the lovely and talented Juliana Gray, who listed Becoming the Villainess in her top five books for the 32 Poems five fave books project. I can’t wait for her book to come out – she’s a great writer and helped initially inspire me to write about comic book themes.

So, I’m heading out to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival, which I missed intensely while I lived in Calfornia – the huge swaths of multicolored flowers, the mist and mud and farmhouses, I love all that stuff. I won’t have much internet access, and hope to write a few poems – and I’ll be a year older when I return!