Gratitude Kenning

This is the Open Write, a place for educators to nurture their writing lives and to advocate for writing poetry in community. We gather every month and daily in April — no sign-ups, no fees, no commitments. Come and go as you please. All that we ask is that if you write, you respond to others to mirror to them your readerly experiences — beautiful lines, phrases that resonate, ideas stirred. Enjoy. (Learn more here.)

Our Host

Mo lives in a Chicago suburb with her husband and two extremely spoiled senior citizen dogs. She is busier than ever after retiring from a career as a middle-school reading specialist. Mo loves to travel and spend time with her family, especially her two talented, charming, intelligent, and handsome grandsons. Lately dreaming up home renovation projects has kept her busy. She co-authored 90 Ways of Community: Nurturing Safe and Inclusive Classrooms Writing One Poem at a Time with Sarah Donovan and Maureen Ingram.

Inspiration 

November is a month of gratitude. It’s a great time to reflect on the people, places, and things that mean so much to us. It’s also a very busy time, what with teaching, conferences, and holiday get-togethers.

Today’s poem is a chance to reflect with gratitude, but allows us to write a short poem so we can also spend time practicing gratitude.

I was looking for a short form and came across the Kenning, a new form to me.

Process

The Kenning comes from Norse myths or legends. A Kenning is a poem that uses two-word phrases as metaphors to describe something. For example, you might use tree-hugger instead of environmentalist.

Think of a person, place, animal, or thing for which you are grateful. Develop a list of attributes and actions for your subject. Think of fun and creative ways to describe your topic without saying who or what it is. Your poem can have as many or as few kennings as you’d like. Think of your poem as if it were a riddle. The hardest part for me was giving the poem a title without giving away my subject.

You can find many examples online, but if you want to use Kennings with students, I found Ken Nesbitt’s Poetry4Kids site rather helpful. 

Mo’s Poem

Life’s-Accomplice

He’s a
Blanket-stealer
Juice-chemist
Lawn-artist
Owie-kisser
Canine-provisioner
Worker-bee
Merriment-maker
Lake-leghorn
Brewing-king
Stertorous-dragon
Wandering-wayfarer
Equal-half
All mine

Your Turn

Now, scroll to the comment section below to write your own poem. (This is a public space, so you may choose to use only your first name or initials depending on your privacy preferences.) Not ready? That’s okay. Read the poems already posted for more inspiration. Ponder your own throughout the day. Return later. And, if the prompt does not work for you, that is fine. All writing is welcome. Just write something. Oh, and a note about drafting: Since we are writing in short bursts, we all understand (and even welcome) the typos and partial poems that remind us we are human and that writing is always becoming. If you’d like to invite other teachers to write with us, tell them to subscribe. Also, please be sure to respond to at least three writers.