Sherryl Clark
My first memory of poetry at school is being made to learn “The Highwayman” off by heart, and it created a longstanding hatred of rhyming poetry in me!
Luckily, I have overcome this to some extent, and even written some rhyming and form poems of my own, but my preference is for free verse. Rhyming poetry is very hard to do well, and so when I teach poetry workshops, I try to steer kids away from it. Only a few can do it naturally well.
I wrote poetry for adults for many years, and had two collections published – Edge and Thicker than Water. When I started writing children’s books, it never occurred to me to write poetry for that audience until I did some workshops in the US with two children’s poets. The poems I wrote there, about growing up on a farm, led eventually to my first verse novel, Farm Kid. Farm Kid won the NSW Premier’s Award for children’s books, and I have since also produced Sixth Grade Style Queen (Not!) (CBCA Honour Book), Motormouth and Runaways. I’ve also written a picture book in free verse – Now I Am Bigger (Working Title Press).
I’m currently working on a fifth verse novel in six voices which is a real challenge!
I teach poetry writing to both children and adults, and continue to write poems for both audiences. In 2006, I created a website – http://www.poetry4kids.net/ because I thought there weren’t enough resources out there. Quite a few Australian poets were very generous and contributed poems for the Poem a Week project on the site.
My main website is http://www.sherrylclark.com/
I can be contacted at sherrylc1@optusnet.com.au
GIFT HORSE
Our neighbours are selling up
moving out
our mean neighbours
who never lend
only borrow
never help
only ask for things
we barely have enough of
Dad sighs, Mum sniffs
the neighbours offer
what they’re throwing out
threadbare carpet
broken couch
worn tyres
frayed ropes
I hate how
we can’t afford to say
no.
© Sherryl Clark
SUNGLASSES
I look cool
in these glasses
in the mirror
I am tinted
smooth
slick
Natalie said
my old glasses
made me look like
a bogong moth
big black orbs
instead of eyes
now I’m cool
lizard cool
beetle cool
cool insect
that’s me.
© Sherryl Clark
FOXES IN THE CITY EAT McDONALDS
In the city, foxes are like stealth bombers,
staying low, dark on dark, barely
a sliver of moonlight in their eyes.
They’re below everybody’s radar,
making hides in stormwater drains and
sewers, by the weed-infested creeks.
They dig, climb, slither,
adapt to metro life like they were
born to it. Fox yuppies
eating McDonalds burgers and KFC
as they glide through the night
in their sleek red fur.
There’s always food on the side of the road
so chickens in flimsy city coops
are sport, the fox’s footy fever moment,
where nothing matters but the chase,
teeth ripping at soft underbellies, the blood-lust,
the squawking victims, the win.
© Sherryl Clark
Is the poem “Foxes in the city eat McDonald’s” about actual foxes or is it a metaphor for people in our society today?
Both, actually- I’m glad you picked that up!