Poems the wind blew in – at a glance
The School Reading Lists’ five word review: fresh, clear, startling & spot-on.
Children’s book title: Poems the wind blew in: Poems for Children.
Children’s author: Karmelo C. Iribarren. Translated from Spanish by Lawrence Schimel.
Illustrator: Riya Chowdhury.
Genre: Poetry.
Published by: The Emma Press
ISBN: 9781912915316
Recommended for children aged: 6+ (for reading aloud) and 8+ (to read independently).
First published: Paperback, November 2019.
Poems the wind blew in is ideal for independent reading and group discussion in KS2.
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Our review:
One day in 2010, when my dog Bill was still alive, I was out running with him in Cannon Hill Park, when we passed a man with his small son. ‘Look, there’s a dog taking his man for a run,’ said the father.
I immediately warmed to this chap; he was being both a good parent (making his child laugh) and a good teacher (showing him that there is more than one way of looking at the same thing.)
This encounter has reappeared in my memory many times, and daily since this book landed on my desk last week. Every page gleams with a fresh, clear visual image, or a startling change in an angle of vision, or a spot-on sight gag.
I especially enjoyed this:
Plastic Bag
Look at it
there
in the middle of the street,
alone,
motionless,afraid
that a street sweeper might appear,dreaming
of a bit of wind
to make it feel
like a cloud.
And this:
Dawning
That cat –
black,
large,
slow –
walking towards
the wallturned
the cornerand took
the night
with it.
I’m sure I won’t be alone in seeing traces of Wallace Stevens, T S Eliot, Ted Hughes and even William Blake in many of these poems. All poets, if they are worth reading and re-reading, have to achieve not only surprise and sleight-of-hand, but also to convince the reader that their poems somehow came from nowhere, like the best melodies. Above all, a reader should have no consciousness of the author’s personality, in exactly the same way that great acting, no matter how famous the actor, lets us see straight through to the truth of the character.
My grandson, only eighteen months old at the moment, has a real treat in store.
Our verdict
I congratulate everybody concerned with this production, which is enlivened and enriched by Riya Chowdhury’s excellent illustrations, and which it gladdens my heart to know was made within walking distance of Cannon Hill Park in Birmingham.
Many thanks to The Emma Press for a review copy.
If you like Poems the wind blew in by Karmelo C. Iribarren, you might also like Storm by Sam Usher, Once Upon a Raindrop: The Story of Water by James Carter, Collected Poems for Children by Ted Hughes, Selected Poems by Wallace Stevens, and Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats by TS Eliot.
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