Posted in A to Z Challenge 2019

# A to Z Challenge, B is for Liz Brownlee

Posted on by Liz Brownlee

Sue Hardy-Dawson, Me and Roger Stevens after our NSTBA win

The second post is me, because I handily have a surname beginning with B. I write poems for kids and I’m a National Poetry Day Ambassador, a role I take very seriously.

I have my own website, but run this website to showcase all children’s poets and the wonderful work they do to celebrate children’s poetry and everything it encourages, such as empathy, understanding, reading ability, education, etc. The website contains poetry videos for kids, poetry activities for kids, poetry games for kids, everything to do with poetry for young people!

I run the Children’s Poetry Summit Twitter feed, as well as my own, and also the Twitter account for KidsPoets4Climate, supporting our children in their fight for their climate. If you have any suitable sustainability poems, do send them for tweeting!  There is also my blog called BetheChange about sustainability for children.

In August, a book of sustainability poems I have written with Matt Goodfellow (link to Matt’s article, What Poetry Offers in the Classroom) and Roger Stevens (link to Roger’s article, Three Simple Steps to Perk Up Your Poems) will be out, called Be the Change – we are all very excited about it!

I also love going into schools, to libraries, performances and literary festivals with all the books’ subjects, but my favourites are animals, rainforest and sustainability readings and workshops.

You might think I’d have no time for writing, but I love writing for children; my books are Animal Magic, Poems on a Disappearing World (about endangered animals), Reaching the Stars, Poems about Extraordinary Women and Girls (about some of the countless women who have shaped history, until now), The Same Inside, Poems about Empathy and Friendship (what it says on the tin), Apes to Zebras, an A-Z of Shape Poems, a book of animal poems in the shapes of the animals they are about, and out on August 8, Be the Change, Poems About Sustainability. 

Reaching the Stars won the prestigious NSTBA for poetry in 2017 and Apes to Zebras won it in 2018, with The Same Inside being shortlisted.

Here is my poem for the poetry feast:

Pelican

And here’s the poem written down!

 

Pelican

.

A pelican scoops up to consume

its seafood soup with its own spoon;

the spoon unfolds into a dish,

and soon as it is full of fish

which wiggle-waggle round inside,

the pelican swallows, goggle-eyed.

Oh, what efficient use of space

to keep a kitchen in its face!

.

© Liz Brownlee, poem and shape.

 

If you’d like to blog hop to another A-Z Challenge, follow this link.

Liz Brownlee

Children’s Poets’ Climate Change blog: Be the Change

Liz’s Blog: Liz Brownlee Poet

Liz’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/Lizpoet

KidsPoets4Climate Twitter: https://twitter.com/poets4climate

Children’s Poetry Summit Twitter: https://twitter.com/kidspoetsummit

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

16 thoughts on “# A to Z Challenge, B is for Liz Brownlee”

  1. Excellent work. I don’t think I noticed in the excitement at the time, but you and Sue have matching tops.

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    1. Ha! I was doing the A-Z here, Jemima, but for some reason had a brain spasm and put the other address on the Linky. THEN I couldn’t find the master list again to edit it… I put the correct one on the theme reveal list, and only found the master list again when the A-Z started. Can’t think what happened but it’s meant I’m having to copy posts… and post them twice!

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  6. “Oh what efficient use of space, to fit a kitchen in its face!” Love your pelican! Delighted to have discovered your children’s poets website; you are a one-person poetry powerhouse! Perfect for a National Poetry Day Ambassador!
    Thank you for having visited my website and giving me the opportunity to track back to yours,
    Cheers,
    Josna

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    1. Well – there aren’t many books published a year, certainly not compared to when I started writing, here in the Uk at least. There will be more in the US, of course. When I started there were about 16 a year (that were anthologies which you could be asked to submit for) but that fell away until there were only about 4. Now things are bit better again. Children’s books in general uphold the book industry, it is a growing area, BUT, contrary to the belief of most people, it is the hardest area to write in. Picture books are the hardest genre to write full stop. You will never get rich writing poetry for children, there were about 5 book ‘asks’ last year and you get paid about £50 per poem. So if you got in them all you’d be paid £250 in total. So I wouldn’t say there was ‘such a market for children’s poems’ at all, really!

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