More Poetry, Please

Nancy Brashear and Carolyn Angus 
For this column we reviewed recently published books that celebrate the power and magic of poetry and will entertain, inform, and engage readers from preschool through middle school and may also inspire them to express themselves creatively through writing their own poems. We encourage teachers to read aloud poetry daily, to incorporate it across the curriculum, and to add poetry books to classroom and school libraries for independent reading. 

And, Too, the Fox. Ada Límón. Illus. by Gaby D’Alessandro. (2025). Carolrhoda. 
In this picture book adaptation of a poem by U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón, readers follow a day in the life of a fox. A series of stunning double-spread illustrations created digitally by Gaby D’Alessandro show a red fox running and bouncing in a wooded area as he hunts for food (“. . . his work,  / which doesn’t seem / like work at all but play”). In a second series of pages, he also stealthily moves through a neighborhood to forage through the trash at night. “Fox lives on the edges, / pieces together / a living out of leftovers // and lazy / rodents too slow for the telephone pole.” The book ends with a thought-provoking connection between humans and wildlife as Fox is pictured eating blueberries in a backyard while a silhouetted child and adult watch from a window before he moves on. (PreK Up)
—CA

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Black Diamond Kings (Sports Royalty). Charles R. Smith Jr. Illus. by Adrian Brandon. (2025). Candlewick. 
Charles R. Smith’s latest Sports Royalty book features poems about 12 outstanding legends of Negro league baseball, including John Henry “Pop” Lloyd, Ray Dandridge, James “Cool Papa” Bell, and Norman “Turkey” Stearnes, complemented by Adrian Brandon’s stylized illustrations, hand-sketched and digitally painted. Smith uses vibrant wordplay, imagery, rhythm, rhyme, repetition, riffs, and varied poetic forms, including free verse, concrete poetry, and name poems, to draw readers in. For example, the poem “INTRODUCING” with its descriptive verses “the magician on the mound / with the endless bag of tricks / with his windmill windup / and high-leg kick, / makes batters disappear / with a quick flick of the wrist” is accompanied by Brandon’s energetic representation of Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige, the first Black pitcher in the American league, in his characteristic pitching pose. Back matter includes “Player Notes” with biographical information and other interesting factoids about each of the players and a “More About the Negro Leagues” section. (Gr 3 Up)
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Cows and Sheep and Chicks That Cheep: Farm Poems. Douglas Florian. (2025). Beach Lane. 
Douglas Florian’s collection of 23 poems about life on a farm opens with “Our Family Farm,” which concludes with “A farmer’s day is never done, / but still our farm is lots of fun!” and an illustration in which a young child stands, arms outstretched, atop a pyramid of seven bales of hay marked with the letters F, A, M, I, L, Y, F, A, R, M. Subsequent poems, printed on single pages (either verso or recto), highlight Florian’s clever wordplay (cows are “udderly big”; the goats naaay “inside their naaay-borhood”) about animals, buildings, chores, crops, a scarecrow, and even a field of five hundred sunflowers. Florian’s childlike, multi-media illustrations on opposing pages contain hidden letters spelling out words. Young children are sure to enjoy visiting Florian’s farm poems with their simple rhymes, humor, and clever artwork. (PreK Up) 
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Five Little Friends: A Collection of Finger Rhymes. Sean Taylor. Illus. by Fiona Woodcock. (2025). Candlewick. 
Each of Sean Taylor’s 35 playful, short poems is paired with a colorful, mixed-media illustration by Fiona Woodcock featuring a child acting out movements to accompany the lines of the rhymes that will serve as a visual guide for young children to follow. As Taylor suggests in the introduction, the verses are meant to encourage reader interaction with the poems. For example, the four couplets of “The Wind”—"Here comes the wind. / The trees swish and sway. // Hold on to your hat! / Or it will blow away! // Great gusts of wind / whirl their way on through. // Hold on to your pants! / Or you might lose them, too!”— are likely to get listeners using their fingers, hands, arms, legs, feet, or whole body in response to the rhymes. (PreS)  
—CA 

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A Forest Song. Kirsten Hall. Illus. by Evan Turk. (2025). Random House Studio. 
Evan Turk’s vibrantly colored, textured illustrations, rendered in gouache, dramatically set the scene for Kirsten Hall’s cento poem in which she weaves words and phrases from the poems of other writers to tell the story of a young child’s adventurous exploration of the natural world. Hall begins A Forest Song by borrowing from lines by Edward Thomas, Robert Frost, Nikolas Lenau, and Sarojini Naidu. “Into the forest, dark and deep, / With miles to go before I sleep . . . // Beneath the holy oaks I wander. / Here, O my heart, just listen!” Back matter includes an author’s note, a list of the poets and the lines they wrote, and “About Cento Poems” and “Write Your Own Cento Poem” sections. (PreK Up) 
—CA

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The Gift of the Broken Teacup: Poems of Mindfulness, Meditation, and Me. Allan Wolf. Illus. by Jade Orlando. (2025). Candlewick. 
Allan Wolf’s collection of 30 contemplative poems is organized into three sections. “The Gift of the Broken Teacup” starts off the Mindfulness section with “I drink my tea / from a broken cup. / …” and ends with “I’ve learned my tea / tastes better this way.” The second section introduces meditative activities in “The Om Poem,” “Yoga,” and other poems. By the time readers have reached the Me section, they are ready to apply strategies such as nurturing oneself through journaling and transforming worry and anger into wonder and relinquishment. The book concludes with a celebration of the present, today, in “The Very Best Day of the Year.” Jade Orlando’s relaxing and refreshing illustrations (created in mixed media and rendered digitally on double spreads) depict children and adults immersed in activities related to the poems and leave young readers with a sense of self-empowerment.  (PreK Up)
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If I Could Choose a Best Day: Poems of Possibility. Irene Latham &
Charles Waters (Eds.). (2025). Candlewick. 
“If you’re reading this, / it’s time to unlock / the door to Possibility. / Trust yourself— / turn the key.” Following their introductory poem, “Welcome,” Irene Latham and Charles Waters selected “best day” poems by 29 poets including Emily Dickinson, Nikki Grimes, Georgia Heard, Guadalupe Garcia McCall, Lilian Moore, and Janet Wong for this compelling anthology in which all of the poems begin with “If,” a word that ignites the imagination. Divided into four sections—Everyday Magic, The Power of You, Kinfolk and Companions, and Anything is Possible—the carefully placed poems are showcased against Olivia Sua’s alluring mixed-media illustrations. For example, the Kinfolk and Companions section includes Lisa Rogers’ titular poem that begins with the lines “If I could choose a best day / it would be sunny / it would be summer // and it would be with you.” Back matter includes “A Note from Irene Latham and Charles Waters” about how they chose these poems from an open call for submission and also previously published poems to create a beautifully balanced collection. (PreK Up)  
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In the Desert (Paws, Fins, Feathers, Claws #9). David Elliott. Illus. by Gordy Wright. (2025). Candlewick. 
David Elliott’s collection of playful, spare poems introduces readers to the desert horned viper, deathstalker scorpion, fennec fox, Nubian vulture, and ten other animals that have survived to make their home in the Sahara, the world’s largest hot desert. The verses, created in a variety of poetic forms, are presented on stunning double-spread paintings by Gordy Wright featuring the animals in their natural habitat. For example, a huge Nile crocodile with a gaping mouth, pictured sitting by a pool, fills the double spread that provides the background for the couplet, “And what are you thinking of now, Old Grinner? / I’m thinking of you, my dear. I’m thinking of dinner.” The back matter includes informative notes about the Sahara Desert and each of the featured animals. (PreK Up)
—CA 

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Seven Skies All at Once. Ted Kooser. Illus. by Matt Myers. (2025). Candlewick. “The skies had hung out their freshly washed clouds / to dry, wanting them to smell the air, / but it looked like rain might be coming.” Former U. S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser’s evocative verse tells the story of different personified skies gathering their clouds over the city before it grows dark and finally starts to rain. For example, “… a third sky was carrying away / great armloads of altocumulus…” Matt Myers’ exquisite, double-spread illustrations, done in oil on wood panels, accurately portray different cloud formations—from wispy cirrus to huge cumulonimbus—as they pass overhead while also telling a second story (presented visually) of the friendship between a boy and a girl who pass messages over the clothesline between the rooftops of their buildings as they help their parents do the laundry. (PreK Up)
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A Universe of Rainbows: Multicolored Poems for a Multicolored World (Spectacular STEAM for Curious Readers). Matt Forrest Esenwine (Ed.). Illus. by Jamey Christoph. (2025). Eerdmans. 
Editor Forrest Esenwine’s anthology features poems that explore nature with playful and insightful language from 20 creative poets (including Alma Flor Ada & F. Isabel Campoy, Nikki Grimes, Heidi E.Y. Stemple & Jane Yolen, Marilyn Singer, and Esenwine) to celebrate the array of rainbow colors in the universe from rainbowfish to moonbows to the rainbow nebula. Each entry includes a poem and a sidebar with additional science-related information displayed against one of Jamey Christoph’s eloquent, multicolored illustrations. For example, in “If the Mountain Could Talk,” Janet Wong ruminates, “The stripes / of Vinicunca / point up to the sky / asking us / to stare at the clouds for a change” on a double spread, with an illustration of the mountain’s colorful pinnacles in the Peruvian Andes and a sidebar describing its seven layers of brightly-hued minerals. Back matter includes recommended resources (books and websites) and a glossary. (PreK Up) 
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Wise Up! Wise Down! John Agard & JonArno Lawson. Illus. by Satoshi Kitamura. (2025). Candlewick. 
What happens when you mix a poetic throw-down between two poets, British Jon Agard and Canadian JonArno Lawson, with a Japanese illustrator, Satoshi Kitamura, chipping in his black-and-white ink and watercolors for extra punch? Throughout 40 pairings, the poets wittily bat their ideas back and forth regarding backyard pests, animals (both real and imaginary), reflections on characters from children’s literature (such as Humpty Dumpty, Cinderella, Goldilocks), and other far-ranging subjects. In the concluding duel, Agard addresses the question of a distressed earth in “Inheritance” with “… Should we dance / or break into gnashing of teeth / at the news of our inheritance?” while Lawson counters in “I’ve Always Liked This Planet” with “… figuring out this strange world will never / be anything less or anything but / a forever-and-ever adventure.” Back matter includes a “Write Your Own Wise Up! Wise Down! Poems” section. (PreK Up) 
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Words with Wings and Magic Things. Matthew Burgess. Illus. by Doug Salati. (2025). Tundra.
Young readers are pulled into this illustrated poetry collection through seven entry portals (Welcome, Wonders, Wild, Wheee!, Whoops & Whallops, Windows, and Whispers & Well Wishes) that each lead to seven original poems in which Matthew Burgess creates new worlds “Where words appear / and fly you far— / Beyond all fear / of who you are.” Through his exploration of fanciful topics in poems such as “The Dragon Piñata,” “The Hungry Yeti,” “The Tiger in My Belly,” and “A Terrible, Horrible Idea,” which employ short rhyming couplets, tercets, quatrains, and creative placement of words, his humorous poems exude action and foster contemplation. Doug Salati’s lively artwork, created with mixed media, splashes across double spreads to sometimes appear on following pages or pops up in vignettes that complement Burgess’s playful poems. Words with Wings and Magic Things will keep children and their grownups engaged to the last word. Back matter includes an index of titles. (PreK Up)
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Nancy Brashear is Professor Emeritus of English at Azusa Pacific University, in Azusa, California. Carolyn Angus is former Director of the George G. Stone Center for Children’s Books, Claremont Graduate University, in Claremont, California.