Posted in A to Z Blog Challenge 2018

Y is for Bernard Young, Children’s Poet and Performer, #AtoZChallenge ZtoA

Posted on by Liz Brownlee

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Bernard Young

Bernard Young is an experienced professional poet and performer who leads writing workshops for children and adults. Bernard’s poems have been broadcast on local and national radio and feature in numerous anthologies of poetry for young readers. His speciality is primary school age. Here is a link to his new book, What are you Like? And here is a link to his website.

Here is one of Bernard’s fab poems:

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Absent

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Dear Teacher,
my body’s arrived
it sits at a table
a pen in its hand
as if it is able
to think and to act
perhaps write down the answer
to the question you’ve asked

but don’t let that fool you.

My mind is elsewhere.
My thoughts far away.

So apologies, teacher,
I’m not here today.

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© Bernard Young

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Author:

Award-Wining Children's Poet, Author, Wildlife and Climate enthusiast, NPD Ambassador, blogger and owner of Lola the retired alert dog and Paddy the alert dog in training. Books include CLiPPA shortlisted Being Me, Poems about Thoughts, Worries and Feelings, Editor of Shaping the World, Author of Be the Change, Apes to Zebras, The Same Inside, Reaching the Stars and Animal Magic. I visit schools, libraries, literary festivals via Zoom and give lessons on writing poetry for children. http://www.poetryroundabout.com http://www.lizbrownleepoet.com @LizBrownlee@zirk.us @Lizpoet

26 thoughts on “Y is for Bernard Young, Children’s Poet and Performer, #AtoZChallenge ZtoA”

  7. Hello Liz, Bernard’s poem was excellent. There is a casual tone to it but, make no mistake, the underlying message is quite serious. How many educational systems are forcing children to cram the lessons into their mind! In countries like India, most of the parents force their children to perform well in school curriculum. We’ve all been told ‘it’s a rat race out there and make sure you are not left behind!’ Depression and stress are prevalent among school kids. There are more engineers and auditors churned out from the system than artists or poets or thinkers. But, I feel the time for change is now. Parents have to be educated first about “educating their children.”

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    1. There are many, many excellent poems like this for conversation and discussion springboards in children’s poetry anthologies and books. Recently, The Same Inside, Poems about empathy and Friendship, also covering tolerance, kindness, disability, differences, racism. etc. Macmillan. didn’t mean to make this into an advert, but this title is important to us!

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  11. What a great poem, and one I can definitely relate to! I like the way you’re being an A-Z rebel and doing the challenge in reverse order. Your blog design is fab too.

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