Alphabet Soup Compiled by Martha Allen
Poetry from Lagunitas School: Grade One through Eight
The Wild by Stephanie Stone , grade 2 The wind is blowing The river is flowing The wild horses are running Through the water
The Dragon by Penelope Hueso, grade 2 He is a big animal he shoots down fire he swoops down to catch fish round he goes in circles up he goes into the cloud bright as the moon he flies up to the light of the night.
Ambitions by Keenan Clarke, grade 8 I wish had time time to play and frolic with friends and family that loved me dearly But I’m old now I have no more family my joints ache
The leaves are twirling The rain has stopped All thanks To the new year!
Hypnotized by Walker Kreps, grade 3
my feet hurt when I walk my ears droop to the floor and my eyes water and become foggy I want to get up to eat but my legs won’t move I try to work but my body just can’t. With wishes so far and deep I just seem to weep I howl and growl but my voice just crackles My Dreams by Sammy Schell, grade 1 My dreams are like a chicken pecking my leg. The chicken is circling my legs It pecks and pecks Until… Oh, it was a dream! I’m just a dog, an old weak dog with ambitons as high as an owl.
I look into my mind I see an infinite reality It is calm in my mind It looks like space almost I see stars and the Milky Way galaxy. When I return, I feel calm.
A Bird by Amara Ketley, grade 3 In the orange sun rays
A bird flies in the clouds, Past the moon over the sun Going on and on for what feels like forever. On nights when the sky is black as coal A mystery where the moon has gone The bird hides a little scared baby In the shadow of the tree. In the sky a bird is a big beautiful flower Or a grain of sand. Chicks peep and learn how to fly, And grow up, Humans are their enemies They cut down trees, Kill the birds use their feathers Eat them for food Cage them up and wings are clipped And its feet are tied But the free birds are happy Flying in the sky.
Basic by Maggie List, grade 8 They say the things I like are basic, I think they are right in the sense they are simple And it’s simply like this: I love to write I love my soft bed sheets I’d move to Europe if I could And I’m mostly made of sugar by this point I love my silly romance novels I love dancing in the rain Hope baggy jeans are here to stay And Taylor Swift makes me incredibly understood Maybe I fall in love with a new fictional character every day I’d live in a garden cottage if I had the chance But I can’t go a day without dancing in my room
Blue by Eden Lerios , grade 1 Blue is a clam river flowing
Like a cool breeze on a summer day Or drinking cool water on a cool day Blue hearts filling the sky Watching clouds go by In the clear blue sky.
They say things I like are basic, I think it’s sunshine bottled up Because if it makes you happy Wouldn’t you want everyone to have a cup?
Becoming by Suzanne Sadowsky
origin of phrases and words. Google is my best friend and my learning compan- ion. I am also fascinated by what I think of as magic– like the synchronicity of things that we call coincidences but happen all the time as we take notice and become aware of them. Like when an old friend suddenly comes to mind and the phone rings and there she is calling me from out of the blue, like magic. Abracadabra! I learned from Instagram that the word abracadabra, a word that evokes magic comes from the Hebrew, “ebrah k’dabri”which means “I create as I speak.” When we speak or write, when we tell our stories we create reality. In the Book of John in the New Testament, it says “In the beginning there was the word…” Many of the older people that I am with these days, talking among ourselves, speak about dying. How do we go about accepting and actually (dis)embodying the idea of what it is to be dead? In my own mind, in my own way I have more or less come to terms with the inevitableness of death. What I think and feel and believe about death and dying may not be true for anyone else, I just go about living my life as best I can. We, all of us, kind of make up stories from fragments of memories of our lives, of what things were like, and what we felt, and what our parents said, and what we wore, and what the weather was like on that day, and that narrative becomes the truth, and if it is written down, it is a real truth. Nowadays, almost every day of our lives is being recorded on our cell phones. I have only one old photograph with a picture of my grandmother Rachel. My grandchildren won’t have to rely on just one snapshot to remember me. As I do memoir writing, I think about my life, about who I am and how I became the person who I am today. Who is this person that people know as Suzanne Sadowsky? How did I become a person who is well known in her com- munity and has assumed various positions of leadership in her work. People know me and I know who they are but I am often embarrassed and feel terrible because I don’t remember everyone’s name who says hello to me. I keep returning to the thought and the feeling that I am an imposter. When I was a girl I was not outspoken and I was not a leader. I didn’t raise my hand in class and I didn’t ask very many questions. That’s the opposite of who I am today. But in some ways inside me I’m still that shy girl who was afraid to speak up. I think about not owning my own strengths, my own voice, my empowerment as a female human being.
For the first time in a very long time I am sitting quietly out- side in my garden. I am taking note of two bumblebees that are circling around the lavender in full bloom. They seem
to know what they are doing. And then I notice the glistening thread of a single strand of a spider web reflecting sunlight weaving its way from the wooden chair in front of me on its way to some other destination but I couldn’t see where she was headed to continue to spin her web. It’s been a long hard winter, the longest rainy season that I can remember in the 50 years that I’ve lived here. Time seems to be going so much more quickly these days and it takes me so long to take get anything done. But every now and again I tell myself I need to slow down take the time to just sit outside and pay atten- tion to the sights and sounds of the world around me.and wonder if the caterpil- lar that a see crawling on a leafy branch has any idea that she will one day turn into a butterfly. I am struck by the interconnectedness of all beings. I spend a lot of time with other people in my day-to-day life but I try to spend one day quietly alone, away from my computer away from meetings, a time for reflection and calmness. I have been writing down the story of my life ever since I took a class in mem- oir writing a few years ago taught by Melanie Vetter at the College of Marin. And then, after Covid, I enrolled in a zoom class offered by West Marin Senior Services, also taught by Melanie. And still now in a small group that meets every two weeks at the San Geronimo Valley Community Center after more than five years of telling my stories I realize that I am repeating myself – telling the same stories over again. Every once in a while a new memory emerges from I don’t know where... I begin to wonder if my memories are real and truthful, or whether I’m repeating stories that I was told by my mother or someone else. As I struggle to get my scattered thoughts organized and written down I realize the essential importance of the words that I choose, as I try to understand, explain to myself the meaning and purpose of my life.
I am fascinated by words and language. I love to look things up to find out the
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Page 16 SGV Community Center Stone Soup
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