Lesson Forrest Hamer

It was 1963 or 4, summer, and my father was driving our family from Ft. Hood to North Carolina in our 56 Buick. We'd been hearing about Klan attacks, and we knew Mississippi to be more dangerous than usual. Dark lay hanging from the trees the way moss did, and when it moaned light against the windows that night, my father pulled off the road to sleep. Noises that usually woke me from rest afraid of monsters kept my father awake that night, too, and I lay in the quiet noticing him listen, learning that he might not be able always to protect us from everything and the creatures besides; perhaps not even from the fury suddenly loud through my body about his trip from Texas to settle us home before he would go away to a place no place in the world he named Viet Nam. A boy needs a father with him, I kept thinking, fixed against noise from the dark.

Fat Is Not a Fairy Tale Jane Yolen

I am thinking of a fairy tale, Cinder Elephant, Sleeping Tubby, Snow Weight, where the princess is not anorexic, wasp-waisted, flinging herself down the stairs. I am thinking of a fairy tale, Hansel and Great, Repoundsel, Bounty and the Beast, where the beauty has a pillowed breast, and fingers plump as sausage. I am thinking of a fairy tale that is not yet written, for a teller not yet born, for a listener not yet conceived, for a world not yet won, where everything round is good: the sun, wheels, cookies, and the princess.

The Rider Naomi Shihab Nye

A boy told me if he roller-skated fast enough his loneliness couldnt catch up to him, the best reason I ever heard for trying to be a champion. What I wonder tonight pedaling hard down King William Street is if it translates to bicycles. A victory! To leave your loneliness panting behind you on some street corner while you float free into a cloud of sudden azaleas, pink petals that have never felt loneliness, no matter how slowly they fell.

Same Song Pat Mora

While my sixteen-year-old son sleeps, my twelve-year-old daughter stumbles into the bathroom at six a.m. plugs in the curling iron squeezes into faded jeans curls her hair carefully strokes Aztec Blue shadow on her eyelids smooths Frosted Mauve blusher on her cheeks outlines her mouth in Neon Pink peers into the mirror, mirror on the wall frowns at her face, her eyes, her skin, not fair. At night this daughter stumbles off to bed at nine eyes half-shut while my son jogs a mile in the cold dark then lifts weights in the garage curls and bench presses expanding biceps, triceps, pectorals, one handed push-ups, one hundred sit ups peers into that mirror, mirror, and frowns too.

Sadie and Maud Gwendolyn Brooks

Maud went to college. Sadie stayed home. Sadie scraped life With a fine toothed comb. She didn't leave a tangle in Her comb found every strand. Sadie was one of the livingest chicks In all the land. Sadie bore two babies Under her maiden name. Maud and Ma and Papa Nearly died of shame. When Sadie said her last so-long Her girls struck out from home. (Sadie left as heritage Her fine-toothed comb.) Maud, who went to college, Is a thin brown mouse. She is living all alone In this old house.