How to Eat A Poem - A Poetry Break

INTRODUCTION
How should you read a poem? With a bland, boring voice or with an excited voice? Great to introduce National Poetry Month or anytime at all, share this poem with the kids. When reading it be passionate about it. Make poetry and exciting experience!




POEM

How to Eat A Poem
by Eve Merriam

Don't be polite.
Bite in.
Pick it up with your fingers and lick the juice that
.....may run down your chin.
It is ready and ripe now, whenever you are.

You do not need a knife or fork or spoon
or plate or napkin or tablecloth.

For there is no core
or stem
or rind
or pit
or seed
or skin
to throw away.

EXTENSION
Invite the kids to share how to "eat" or read a poem. Ask them to share what a poem means to them. Are they fun? Boring? Silly? Cool? See what they say!

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cullinan, Bernice E. 1996. A Jar of Tiny Stars: Poems by NCTE Award-Winning Poets. Honesday, PA: Boyds Mills Press. ISBN: 1563970872.

(Poem originally published in the book It Doesn't Always Have to Rhyme, 1966).