blueprints

aBout river oF words
robert hass
In classrooms all over the United States, at 4-H and Girl Scout meetings,
youth detention centers, natural history museums, and in some English
language classrooms overseas, children in the late fall and early spring
write poems and make works of art about the natural world and the places
where they live. A thirteen-year-old from Baton Rouge might make a
painting of a red alligator and, with a touch of wit, entitle it I Got the
Blues. 1
Or a six-year-old from Northern California might be writing a poem
of inner and outer weathers and call it “Sad Sun.” 2
Oh sun. Oh sun.
Oh sun. How does
it feels to be
blocked by the
dark dark clouds?
Oh child
it doesn’t really
feel bad at all
not at all not at
all not at all.
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