Author's Day with Brod Bagert

Brod Bagert has brought his poetry to schools across the country and around the world.  Today, we welcome him to Lafayette School!  Poetry on Parade will post photos and video from the Author's Day presentations when available.  
Audience plays an important role in Brod Bagert's poetry:  he says, "I write my poems to entertain an audience, so when the audience changes, the poems change."  For early elementary school groups, he uses repetition, chants, and easy rhyme patterns.  For older elementary crowds, he introduces story-telling and more complicated rhyme.
Brod Bagert often compares poetry to music: the sounds of words, along with their meaning, help tell the story of the poem.  Poetry Paraders know that onomatopoeia words-- words that imitate the sounds they represent-- give our poetry a little extra boom, bang, zing, and zip!

Our Author's Day guest believes that performing poetry makes us better writers, readers, and speakers: that sharing a poem improves our communication skills, our comprehension skills, and the way we relate to each other and to the world around us.  He also understands that it takes a bit of courage to stand in front of an audience for the first time:

Heart Stopper 

I'm standing on the stage,

The play's about to start,

And the only sound I hear

Is the pounding of my heart.

It was everything I wanted--

My fantasy... my goal.

So I tried out for this play

And I got the leading role.

I learned my lines, I practiced,

I came so very far,

I dreamed about this moment--

I was going to be the STAR!

So here I am on stage,

And the play's about to start.

My life was so much simpler

Before I got this part.

-- Brod Bagert

Today, Poetry on Parade also celebrates the invention of  the world-famous "brain tonic and intellectual beverage," Coca-Cola.  On March 29, 1886, Dr. John Pemberton brewed the very first batch of the refreshing, fizzy beverage as a  homemade cure for his stomach ache and headache!

My Lunch 

A candy bar.

A piece of cake. 
A lollipop. 
A chocolate shake. 
A jelly donut. 
Chocolate chips. 
Some gummy worms 
and licorice whips. 
A candy cane. 
A lemon drop. 
Some bubblegum  
and soda pop. 
Vanilla wafers. 
Cherry punch. 
My mom slept in 
while I made lunch. 

-- from Revenge of the Lunch Ladies by Kenn Nesbitt

Let's celebrate Author's Day and Coca-Cola Day by sharing a poem and a smile.  Like the jingle (a catchy, often musical advertising slogan) says, It's the Real Thing!