Hi all,
Thank you for all your wonderful poetry so far. You’ve been very generous sharing your poems with us.
Please leave your comments on Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem here and also share any poems you have created with us.
Hi all,
Thank you for all your wonderful poetry so far. You’ve been very generous sharing your poems with us.
Please leave your comments on Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem here and also share any poems you have created with us.
I enjoyed Brooks poem because first he wrote down the words and then used in his poem here is my own poem using brooks words.
My mother is a bad woman,
she and her friends once stole our neighbors gate,
and blamed it all on me,
and at that night she went to jail,
she loves to play and strut in winter down,
the rough and untended street,
with black paint on her face and
wear black lace stockings while growing hungry weed all the time.
But i want to be a wonderful,brave and honest woman,
who always gives money to the charity children,
and i want a good life but my mother always says
that i am going to fail at what ever i am doing and i don’t want to grow
weed but grow roses instead.
I really do want a good life and not be like my mother.
Hi Kevin,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. It’s interesting that your poem is clearer in terms of who is acting out of kindness than the original which is more ambiguous. You’ve used Brooks’ words in an interesting and creative way and you’ve created some lovely expressions.
Keep up the hard work.
Hey Kevin I really enjoyed reading your poem. It was very detailed and interesting
Ruqayyah Rahman
Grafton Primary School
hey kevin that is very inpressive
i really enjoyed making my own poem with many words and also it was really fun doing it. i really enjoy writings this poem. this is my poem.
The streets are wonderful
Mother is really brave
Women staying up all night
Peeking through the front yard
Mother wakes up early and smells the rose
Mother were’s yellow stockings
She says it keeps her warm
Mother can be a bit rough sometimes
But than she says sorry dear
The charity children always runs down the ally way
They pick weed for there mothers
When mother is sick in the winter
I help her feel better
I hear other mothers saying
When you get older you will go to jail
My mother never says that because she never tells tails
She hates the color black
So she will never ever paint the walls black
Mother has never been bad to me ever
And she nevebr will be
Peoples life’s are taken away so me and my mother pray for them
My mother is also honest
Mother plays with me everyday time to time
She loves the look of my face
so she always kisses it
My mother grows lots of fruit for people to eat
Mother ties my lace
I only ask her because she does it the best
Maisha Begum Grafton School
Hi Maisha,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. I I think it’s very clever the way you’ve used Brooks’ language to create such a positive image of the mother. Did creating your own poem help you to understand Brooks’ original poem better?
I like the poem it’s great but you need to try and add some full stops because I can’t breathe in the middle Clay Harrow Pakeman Primary School Red Class.
i really liked this poem it was interesting i loved it
here is my poem
Mother stayed in the front yard,
the streets were rough and had paint all over it,
it was winter,
life wasn’t easy,
people went to jail,
children were bad,
they were upset.
Children stayed at each others house
but all they could see was some mouse.
There was no time to waste they had to get home
but they wanted to go alone.
My mother sneers but i say it’s fine
she tells me i need to sleep at quarter to nine.
The children hang around at their back gate but they don’t realize how late it is.
Charity kids have paint on their face
everyone laughs and says it looks like a piece of lace.
Brave children fight a bear,
with its back full of hair.
Hi Baris,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us.
I like your opening stanza with its short phrases and quick pace. Then you try to make your poem rhyme. It’s good to experiment but sometimes the rhyme can dominate the poem rather than the message you’re trying to make. Perhaps next time just use two rhyming lines at the end so you can focus on your message throughout.
I enjoyed making our own poems using the words that Gwendolyn Brooks used in her poem. This is my poem.
I play with the children from the charity shop,
All my life from winter to summer,
My mother says I’m rough and bad and I’m sick of her,
But some women say I’m wonderful and honest.
We wonder the streets untended and wear black lace,
Sometimes the gate is locked and we be brave and unlock it with a rose that grows there,
Sometimes we paint our faces,
We strut down the roads at night,
Passed jail and peek at someones front yard,
That person sneers in the ally at all times,
We sometimes have stayed there looking at her weed or play with our stockings.
By Sophia Sergides
Grafton School
Hi Sophia,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. The image that stays with me is the gate that is unlocked by a rose… it seems symbolic…almost like beauty can find a way.
Keep on working on your poetry.
Hi Sophia,
I like your poem do you do lodes of poems ?
It is fantastic you need to do more poems now come on you need to do this confidons and hard working.
Hey Sophia
I really really liked reading your poem
Ruqayyah Rahman
Grafton Primary School
Flowers
One is purple,
one is blue.
The sense of them,
shine just like you.
Some are tall,
some are small.
Some grow and some don’t
They are wonderful,
and some are not.
Some sneer and some do not.
When its night they turn and face down,
and when its light,
they open safe and sound.
Some are in your back yard,
and want to be hidden.
They want you to keep a secret,
if you ever find them.
They shine like stars,
and we love them .
They open like a rose,
but still hidden inside.
By Rita
Christ the King School.
Hi Rita,
It’s lovely to see you experimenting with your own poetic style and theme. I like some of the similes you use.
Keep up the hard work.
PS..Christ the King should be using the Maamulaha Poetry blog rather than this one.
the same life
life stayed the same,
the wonderful rose sneers down,
at unattended weed.
bad charity uses children. rough life stayed the same.
time,
we just need time.
the alley is winter,
its all you will ever see.
a dead end.
no change!
black lace has always stay the same.
honest night is my only friend.
so I grow brave but,
the rose grows too,
they strut and peek.
winter sick stayed the same.
front yard life is never near,
we stayed in the black night.
life stayed the same.
by Emily loeschner
from Christ the king primary school
Hi Emily,
You have some memorable phrases here. I like your use of repetition at the start of your second stanza and your personification of night.
This is very promising work. Keep on working hard.
PS..Christ the King should be using the Maamulaha Poetry blog rather than this one.
Time Ends Here
My face grew to peek
children sneer in the rough back yard.
Once charity children play
unattended alley ways,
strutting once,
brave and bad,
grows a deep dark winter,
TIME ENDS HERE.
Mother and children
I am very sick
I’ll be honest now.
Once on a dark night
jail sneered at a
young, honest woman.
I now place a rose to your willing hearts covered with appreciation.
TIME ENDS HERE.
Wonderful life,
I complain with pain
I suffered
now let me enter through that gate.
MY TIME ENDS HERE…
Hi Caitlin,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. I really like your use of a refrain and how you subtly change the last line which brings such a sad tone to the poem.
Keep up the hard work and we look forward to reading more of your poems soon.
A woman struts down the streets with paint on her face,
children play in the front yard,
I watch my sick mother lay in bed, she gets sick of a rose every time she goes near one,
I walk down the winter streets ,
when people are bad and play rough,
my dad once told me they will go to jail one day.
Sitting on the chair watching tv,
I see brave black people fighting the police.
down the alley I go seeing people wear winter clothes,
there she lay dead in this cold winter ,
that’s why life doesn’t that long
by jasmine
Hi Jasmine,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us.
I really like the line when the mother “gets sick of a rose”…It seems symbolic … as if she’s sick of beauty itself.
I think you’ve got a very good poem lurking here ….perhaps you’d like to go back and link the stanzas together?
i really enjoyed brooks poem because it sometimes rhymes and i was saying sometimes you should get up to mischeif
here is my poem with the words we were given
The best way is the alley
where wonderful woman live
they paint there face
and don’t even wear black stockings
mother said charity we will have to buy
for are clothes and food
i always wanted to go to jail
and be bad and i thought to
myself why would i want
to be sad then
and we will have to live on the street
where the charity children live
Hi Lattina,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. Like Brooks I think you should the attraction of freedom and breaking the rules.
Keep on working hard.
Mother wears black in the steet
I want to play with the orphanage children
Mother thinks there bad.
The woman in jail comes out in night
The streets are sick but
a wonderful woman lives there.
Im honest with my face
but have a bad life.
I wish I could get out
of the front gate in winter
but thats what I put up with it
and thats life for me.
Hi Mohamed and Nick,
I really like the line “the streets are sick” … with the contrast with the wonderful woman. I think your third stanza is very interesting too.
Keep up the hard work.
My mother, a wonderful woman
always Honest,even in the sick streets
at night
My Friend,Johnnie Mae
likes black lace and Paint on her face
and loves to play in Jail,feeling brave
The weed and rose always grows
When winter comes and sneers
Someone had peek in the front
The rough yard stayed here all my life
And then I will
strut in stockings beside the charity shop
Bad children hang out at the untended alley
Just wasting time
And I want to be one of ’em
Hi Angelina,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. I like the way you use line breaks to place emphasis on certain words and phrases. I really like the line “The weed and rose always grows”…it’s a great contrast and I think Brooks would have approved.
Keep on working hard.
I like this poem mostly because of the rhymes and I would recommend it too someone else.
Gillespie
I realy liked brook’s poem because it had lots of metaphores and sybols
here’s one I made up:
Children play as part of their life,
some children are rough and bad,
wanting to sneer at every one,
but they all play in the front yard.
by time,they will grow up,
walking on the alley, wearing black,
by this time, they might go to jail,
where they were darck and dull clothes.
soon they will grow old,
with charities helping them,
they will finally see their children and grandchildren,
and for the last time they shall breathe.
Their will be carried to heaven,
or maby to hell,
but they will all start a brand new life,
getting everything they want
Ahura farhadi
Grafton Primary School
Hi Aruha,
It’s very interesting the way you’ve taken a poem by Brooks that focuses on a moment in time in a teenagers life and altered it to consider a lifetime.
It’s encouraging to see you experimenting in this way.
It’s very interesting the way you’ve taken a poem by Brooks that focuses on a moment in time in a teenagers life and altered it to consider a lifetime.
It’s encouraging to see you experimenting in this way.
I found Brooks poem very intriguing because he wrote down some words and then used them to help him with the poem . Now I am going to write my own poem using some of the words Brooks used.
Mother Says !!!
My mother says I’m a bad woman,
But I say I’m alright.
She asked me why stay out at night,
And always end up in a fight.
She said I will soon go to Jail,
And always fail.
Mother says in the back yard,
Life is hard.
She says don’t walk down the alley way,
The children are bad and don’t like to play.
I say I want to wear the brave stockings of night black lace,
And strut down the street with paint on my face.
Hi Jaden,
I like the way you’ve altered the poem (adding rhyme in places ) but you’ve kept the message the same and focused on the tension between the adult and teenager.
NELSON MANDELA’S WIFE PROBLEM.
The street mother lays rough sick and
stayed on the alley of a stockings road.
she was put to jail and a woman sneers
at the the street mother as she suffers
pain and wain throughout jail for 27 years .
The mother gets sick of the weed but a saver
appears and his name was Nelson Mandela
saves a mother’s life after spending 27 years
in jail but could the sick mother survive with.
Nelson Mandela he has help this mother
he has made something good in the sick mothers life spending
half of a pound on one person and that’s how love
followed between them and this mother is able to
share her experience with others who have been.
Like that.
This is what Nelson Mandela’s wife says
[But were i stayed was terrible me and my husband spend
27years in the same jail.]
Hi David,
This is a unique approach to using Brooks work. It is an interesting idea to update a work and make it modern.
Keep on experimenting and trying out new ideas.
I really like Gwendolyns poem because its very origanal.
This is my poem:
The Black peek.
The black peek.
where nothing grows
and charity children are made sick.
An untended wasteland
painted with weeds.
It wears a rough face
scareing any honest women.
A vicious alley.
Looks dead enough for a jail.
Where every devil is born.
Martha Stagg Gillespie School
Hi Martha,
What a wonderful poem! You’ve changed it from focusing on a person to a place. Some wonderful phrases “untended wasteland” and your use of personification is effective too.
I hope you continue to share your poetry with us.
Down at the alley,
painted with weeds,
where the charity children play,
in the black of night,
the rich may sneer,
but the children just laugh.
Down at the alley,
painted with weeds.
Down at jail,
Where the sickness grows,
the charity children take a peek,
with their lace stockings on,
they strut down the street.
Down at jail,
where sickness grows
Down in the front yard,
where the rough roses multiply,
the untended dump,
where braveness stays.
Down in the front yard,
where rough roses multiply
Marnie Prentice Gillespie School
Hi Marnie,
This is a promising poem. I like your use of a refrain to start your sentences and your final stanza is sophisticated with its use of repetition.
We look forward to reading more of your poetry soon.
Racism
The brave black woman
faced jail.
The rough children
had a bad life.
The mother tried
to protect but it wasn’t enough!
Gillespie
Hi Sadequl,
Your poem is a good example that you don’t have to write lots of lines to create a mood. Your poem is short but quickly captures the sadness of the mother’s situation.
Keep up the hard work.
Life? What is it worth living for?
When an honest man walks down the street,
The rough boys eye him out,
They don’t have anything else to do,
Then to mug an innocent mother. Life
Life? What is it worth living for?
When a brave black woman,
Stands up for her right,
Gets shot by a bad racist man. Life
Life? What is it worth living for?
When in winter a theif,
Hijacks a car,
And takes the food from an untended house. LIFE
Raffy Gillespie
HI Raffy,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us.
Your poem is one of the first to use questions to involve the reader. It’s a very effective technique and makes us consider the injustice of the situation.
This is my poem for this week:
Dark Life
An honest woman
black in lace
struts down the alley
with sneers in her face
The black children
brave and honest
face the rough jail
with their mothers fondest
Their life is hard and dark
the black seperation
grows in their face
as a life threatining motion
written by Issy Judd Hawkes Gillespie school
Hi Issy,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us.
I think your opening stanza with the description of the woman is very powerful; particularly the sneering face.
Until it Came
The mother,sick,untended
Was a wonderful woman,
until it came.
Out of the alley,
it struts,
black,growing.
Until it came.
Sneering,
the time to see it’s face,
peek at it,
until it came.
Walking down streets,
opening jails,
freeing prisoners…
IT HAS COME!
Gillespie
Hi Joe,
You create a sense of suspense but with holding from us what it is that’s coming…
What is it? A monster?
The Girl Wishes!
The untended alley grew weeds
where the charity children play
the girl wishes she could be there, one day
her mother struts down the street.
The girl peeks through the gate
she wonders where her mother goes this late
soon winters here
all the roses begin to fade.
The untended alley doesn’t grow
the charity children don’t play
the girl wishes she can go,one day.
Gillespie School
Hi Kareema,
Like a number of other students from your school you’ve chosen to make the focus of the poem the place rather than the people. I think that’s a very interesting approach.
I think to develop your poetry try to think of as different to a story. A story is often driven by a plot…this happens, then this and then …. in poetry you can just stop in a moment of time and explore it further.
It was a cold winters night
as the rose began to grow
My love had left me once
more.
I sat in my mothers untended
yard, the moon sneering
down at me.
Soon I will be a charity
case, when my sick mother
dies.If im honest I dont
know why life is so hard.
Weeds are begining to
tangle my mind.Oh
please let my love return.
from Daisy at gillespie xxx
HI Daisy,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. Your first two stanzas are very powerful and I think you use line breaks in a sophisticated way …particularly the break in the third and fifth line.
I think your third and fourth stanza needs some further work although I like the idea of the weed entangling someone’s mind.
Promising work. Please continue to share your poems with us.
Life?
The wonderful women saw the sick childern playing in the alley.
Life,the colour of the red rose dieing .
The black women had paint on her face.
Life atleast she died peacfully.
Hi Memo,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. You create some vivid images like the ‘red rose dying’.
Keep up the hard work
The Woman’s and children’s Jobs!
The black brave woman face the children
the mother cuts the yard
The wonderful woman gave money to the charity children
The children painted the black jail
The hard working children fell in the yard.
Gillespie School
HI Kennedy,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. I’m left wondering why the children fall in the yard? Were they exhausted?
The strreets stayed still nothing but silence
Children were playing rough through the alley
Roses were growing, weeds were invading
All you can hear nothing but silence.
Mothers were cooking
Bad children were playing
The tree swayed towards the jail
Black people were going to face there fear
People waited as it was raining
Fathers were complaining
But still there was nothing but silence.
from Jannat at gillespie
Hi Jannat,
I really like the way you make the focus of your poem the lack of sound… the focus on silence suggests that no one hears these people. It’s a very clever idea.
Keep on working hard.
The Broken Gate!
The children play near the black gate
where weeds grow in front of the jail
where black woman go.
The child had paint on her face
while the mother wore black lace.
They both strut down the rough alley
seeing the charity children play
they return at night with their broken gate.
Gillespie School
Hi Nimah,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us.
I have to ask why do they return with a broken gate? Does the broken gate symbolise something?
THE HORROR OF LIFE
In the dark black sreets
someone sneers
and someone peeks
in the yard of the alley way
The lady with a painted face
walks down the alley
with black stockings
on her face
The black women
that is struck down with lace on her face
lifetime stayed the same
The bad sick charity children
sneers and peeks againts
the black gates
gillespie
the black gaits
with b
Hi Ovanaah,
What a great title. It prepares the reader for the poem that lies ahead. I think titles are very important so I’m pleased to see you considering this in your work.
The black woman
hiding behind the gate
Shouting for help
In the dark winter night
running through the streets
for her life
Her mother
wearing balck trying to be brave
but her pain grew more
Children peeking throuth the alley
Even bad woman
gets sick looking at it
The honest woman
living a wonderful life
gets killed!
because she was painted with black skin
from Gillespie
Hi Rabbiya,
That’s an interesting approach to make the poem more explicitly about racism than the original poem.
What do you think Brooks was saying in her poem about the life of black Americans?
CHILDERN
children peek through
the jail looking for their
mother who was brave,
the children put paint
on their face and wore black
navy lace spite they were unhappy .
the jail was black only seans whites never
came, the children were upset all they
could do was wait
Hi Blessing,
Thank you for sharing your poem with us. Again I like your title although your title is more mysterious and leaves us waiting to learn what will happen to the children.
Did you manage to finish this poem or did you have some further ideas?
I want to go on holiday
I’ve love to go on holiday all my life.
I want to go to New Zelend where it’s nice and cool and all around.
A boy gets sick of the sun.
I want to go there right now And maybe it will be possible to where the people go.
I want to go today.
Continue!!
The people at the restaurant laugh a lot they do funny day and night.
At the pool I wish there are some diving board and I want to see lots of handsome boys.
I hope my mum and dad take my to a wonderful beach and I want to see beautiful fish all around me.
Hi Clayton,
You started to do something very interesting with the poem when you changed the gender of the main character and made it a boy. It’s an interesting question to consider: how would this be different if it was a boy rather than a girl.?
How do you think this would change Brooks poem?
Love your poem
Elif-sue
Pakeman primary School
Some people
Some people talk and talk and never say a thing
Some people look at you and birds begin to sing
Some people laugh and laugh and yet you want to cry
some people touch your hand and music
Fills the sky.
Pakeman Primary school. By: KHALID AHMED
Hi Khalid,
I really like your opening line. It’s like an oxymoron … when you put two opposite ideas together. It works really well… I like your last line too.
Keep up the hard work.
HELLO KHALID
youre poem is really good i would like to read another one of youre peom it looks like Brooks is poem.
I’ve been strangle all my life .
I want to be free ,
Where it’ clam and peaceful and quite.
A life get sick. Of noise .
I want to go to the Fun fire now
And may be it will be fun,
To where a good time today.
They do some other things
They have some amazing fun .
My life is strong but I say it’s fine
From Nafiso Ahmed from Pakeman Primary School Red class
Hi Nafiso,
Thank you for your poem.
I think you manage to capture the sense of longing to be free that Brooks shows in her speaker.
Keep up the hard work.
hello nafiso
i really engoy your work and it was like the Brooks peom.
I really enjoyed doing the poems because it was really fun.
Here is my made up poem.
My mother is a wonderful women who is as honest as a rose
with black lace stockings and brave children she grows
she works for charity and always peeks at the front door waiting
for snow, she says winter is a fun time of the year except for those unfortunate
But my dad is in jail because he wasn’t very sensible
he used to grow weed in our rough yard and used to go
on the streets and have fights he has a very bad life
he stays in a dark room and is only aloud to go outside
when he has time
Blertina Konxheli
Grafton School
HI Blertina,
I like the way you’ve created contrast in your stanzas with the different focus on a mother and father.
I think perhaps you could consider using line breaks more… do you think some of your lines are a bit long?
Hey Blertina I agree with you the poem was very fun. And I got into it really easily. I do think that there should be a few full stops.
Ruqayyah Rahman
Grafton Primary School
here is my poem, The Longing Of A Girl
I’ve had to stay in the front yard all my life
because my mother says the black Streets round the back are like a sick jail were no honest women dare go
and were the older charity children in the night play in lacy stockings as dark as night itself .
And the winter found in the front yard of the house is occupied by people who always wear paint on their face and strut down the street near the unattended alley enough for a weeping rose.
Only brave but bad children who sneer at fear play around our yard says mother but if I’m honest id like to take a peek and see the weed and how it grows.
Hi Kayla,
I like the way you’ve created your own poem but kept the mood and message of Brooks.
I think you might like to consider where you could use line breaks to bring greater emphasis to certain words and phrases.
Hello Kayla I really enjoyed reading your poem. It was really interesting.
Ruqayyah Rahman
Grafton Primary School
Winter is finally here,
Skies are darker
In cold night you can see and smell Christmas cheer
Fuzzy socks smoothing my body.
I enjoyed making our own poems from the words from the grid.
Black streets and jail gates and all the bad children playing.
Honest times have gone wonderful paintings destroyed by brave children.
Wearing lace has stopped. Mother crys at night time when rough children fight.
Women to scared to let their kids in the front yard. Life fades.
We had a peek through the ally and saw bright red roses and wished the whole world was like that.
By Holly Fay
Grafton School
I enjoyed doing our own poems with the words from the grid. Here is my poem:
A mother wears a black lace
With a wonderful look on her face
Shes a brave woman
My mother is sick of children
She says children are maggots
The streets look strange
Where its rough as the rubbish grows
I like yours Hamda its interesting