Read Some of Ellen’s Summer Poetry

Summer Grass

Witchgrass, Switchgrass, in-the-roadside-ditch grass;
Junegrass, strewn grass, waving-on-the-dune grass;
        Everywhere I pass, grass. Everywhere I see

Bluegrass, new grass, wet-with-morning-dew grass;
Stiff grass, sniff grass, growing-on-the-cliff grass;
       Everywhere I pass, grass. Everywhere I see

Foxtail, Squirreltail, standing-brown-and-stale grass;
Barley, Timothy, tickles-on-the-knee grass;
         Everywhere I pass, grass. Everywhere I see

Sweet Grass, peat grass, soft-beneath-my-feet grass;
Clump grass, stump grass, even-in-the-dump grass;
Shy grass, high grass, almost-to-the-sky grass!
       Everywhere I pass, grass – and grasses pass me!

EBO

Wind Dance, 1999,  Scholastic Canada

Summer Reading

I read a book this summer when we traveled to the shore.
I read it in the car till I reached page twenty-four.
I read it in the boat to the motor’s steady hum,
Until the water splashed and sprayed on page thirty-one.

I read it on the beach when we got ourselves to land.
Now page forty-seven is speckled brown with sand.
I read it with an ice cream in the hot and melting sun,
When drops of sticky chocolate fell on page fifty-one.

I read it in a hammock when a spider from the tree
Came down and crawled across the words on page sixty-three.
I read it by the fire roasting marshmallow quite late.
Now page eighty-seven sticks to page eighty-eight.

I read it in my sleeping bag (no one could see the light).
I read until I’d finished in the middle of the night.
Then I read the last page over and over one more time,
Until my head dropped down to sleep on page ninety-nine!

EBO

“Chickadee,” Summer, 1995

Ribbon Seller’s Song

Ribbons, ribbons, plenty of ribbons!
Will anyone buy from me
Ribbons of sunlight,
Ribbons of seaweed,
Ribbons of bark from the tree?
Ribbons, ribbons, I sell ribbons.
Will anyone stop to buy
Ribbons of rootlets,
Ribbons of rainbows,
Ribbons of cloud from the sky?

EBO

Wind in my Pocket, 1990, Breakwater Books.
Wind Dance, 1999, Scholastic Canada

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Header illustration from A Letter from the Snow