{"id":5547,"date":"2022-03-13T00:01:28","date_gmt":"2022-03-13T06:01:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=5547"},"modified":"2022-06-07T20:15:18","modified_gmt":"2022-06-08T02:15:18","slug":"7-imps-7-kicks-786-featuring-richard-jones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blaine.org\/sevenimpossiblethings\/?p=5547","title":{"rendered":"7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks #786: Featuring Richard Jones"},"content":{"rendered":"

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“We keep our fire safe in a playpen \/ where we feed it,
mostly leftovers from the woods …”<\/em>
(Click illustration to read the poem, “Fireplace,” in its entirety)<\/em><\/center>
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\nDear Imps, pull up your cyber-chairs (and bring your best coffee and favorite breakfast dishes) to read about this poetry collection from award-winning poets Ted Kooser<\/a><\/strong> (former U.S. Poet Laureate) and Connie Wanek<\/a><\/strong>. They joined forces for Marshmallow Clouds: Two Poets at Play among Figures of Speech<\/a><\/em><\/strong> (Candlewick, March 2022), illustrated by Richard Jones<\/a><\/strong>, and the results are immensely satisfying. “The poems in this book,” Kooser writes, “are about fooling around, about letting one’s imagination run free with whatever it comes upon.” Adds Wanek: “[I]t’s fun to listen for voices from unexpected places.”<\/p>\n

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This collection of 30 poems (if you include the two bonus poems provided in the book’s backmatter) is framed by the four elements (save the opening poem, “A Disappointment”). The section called “Fire” presents a thunderstorm as someone bumbling about in the middle of the night; a secret as something you can let go of and send to the fiery stars (“It’s safe to tell a secret to the stars \/ aliens all”); and the crimson leaves of November as reluctant to fall, longing to “cling to summer.” The second section, “Water,” brings us an upturned boat, “waiting … peering out at the meddlesome world”; a walk after a rain as a story in five verses in which the speaker wonders what might happen “in the world without me”; and, in “Why Pets Don’t Write,” guppies as authors chronicling their hunger and fear. In “Air,” we meet flies who dare to land on flyswatters; the open air of a June afternoon; and the dust that a harpist onstage sends into “circle[s] of light.” And in “Earth,” the moon is a kind of forensics scientist at the crime scene that is a bad dream; a book is, delightfully, likened to a sandwich; and a barn is personified: “Day in and day out it wakes and pulls on \/ its patched-up underwear of rotten boards \/ beneath its coveralls of corrugated metal, \/ and looks out over what’s always the same, \/ and combs its roof straight down the middle.” (To be sure, the old barn “likes what it has, its peace \/ and quiet.”)<\/p>\n

These playful and inviting free verse poems, bursting with evocative figurative language and vivid imagery and striking a wide variety of tones, awaken the senses. They create a startling, refreshing, brand-new awareness about the subjects above \u2014 and so many more. Some wise editor somewhere paired British illustrator Richard Jones to this project, and the choice couldn’t have been better. He knows precisely what to illustrate \u2014 and what to leave out in the name of allowing us readers to bring our own imagination to the table. Cases in point? The spreads pictured here today. <\/p>\n

Enjoy!
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“… But so much happens over \/ immense ammounts of time, such as
365 horses turning into an engine,
and someday, if we’re lucky \/ back into horses.”<\/em>
(Click spread to enlarge and read “Gas” in its entirety)<\/em><\/center>
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“… Spring on the prairie, \/ a sunny day, a sky reaching out to forever
in every direction …”<\/em>
(Click spread to enlarge and read “Spring” in its entirety)<\/em><\/center>
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(Click cover to enlarge)<\/em><\/center>
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\nMARSHMALLOW CLOUDS: TWO POETS AT PLAY AMONG FIGURES OF SPEECH. Text copyright \u00a9 2022 by Ted Kooser and Connie Wanek. Illustrations copyright \u00a9 2022 by Richard Jones and reproduced by permission of the publisher, Candlewick Press, Somerville, MA.<\/em><\/p>\n

* * * Jules’s Kicks * * *<\/strong><\/font>
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Note for any new readers: 7-Imp\u2019s 7 Kicks is a weekly meeting ground for taking some time to reflect on Seven(ish) Exceptionally Fabulous, Beautiful, Interesting, Hilarious, or Otherwise Positive Noteworthy Things from the past week, whether book-related or not, that happened to you. New kickers are always welcome.<\/p>\n

1)<\/strong><\/font> Last weekend’s IBBY conference<\/a><\/strong> was lovely. <\/p>\n

2)<\/strong><\/font> It was in the 60s this week, but this morning we woke up to snow. <\/p>\n

3)<\/strong><\/font> A new song<\/a><\/strong> from Regina Spektor … <\/p>\n

4)<\/strong><\/font> … which reminded me that she wrote one of my favorite songs ever, so I listened to it really loud in the car. (I think I’ve kicked about this before, so I apologize for the redundancy. But that melody gets me every time.)
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