Paul B. Janeczko (1945–2019)
Author of A Kick in the Head: An Everyday Guide to Poetic Forms
About the Author
Paul Bryan Janeczko was born in Passaic, New Jersey on July 27, 1945. He received a bachelor's degree in English from St. Francis College in 1967 and a master's degree in English from John Carroll University in 1970. While teaching public high school, he created his own poetry anthology to use in show more his classes. He retired from teaching in 1990 after 22 years. He became a poet and anthologist best known for his poetry anthologies for children. From the 1980s through the early 2000s, he was the compiler for several anthologies including Pocket Poems: Selected for a Journey, I Feel a Little Jumpy Around You: A Book of Her Poems and His Poems Collected in Pairs, and A Kick in the Head: An Everyday Guide to Poetic Forms. He wrote several poetry collections including The Crystal Image, Requiem, Worlds Afire, and The Proper Way to Meet a Hedgehog and Other How-to Poems. His novel, Bridges to Cross, was published 1986. He died on February 19, 2019 at the age of 73. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Works by Paul B. Janeczko
I Feel a Little Jumpy Around You: A Book of Her Poems and His Poems Collected in Pairs (1996) — Editor — 121 copies
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1945-07-27
- Date of death
- 2019-02-19
- Gender
- male
- Birthplace
- Passaic, New Jersey, USA
Members
Reviews
Cute and fun poems for all ages.
Can be challenging to read as not all the shapes have a predictable way to read the poem. However, the ones I can read easily are quite clever.
First sentence: Home
East side, West side,
all around the town.
Which side
is the best side?
Wherever you sit down
to eat your supper, pet your cat,
do homework, watch TV.
Any old place
that's your home base
is where you want to be.
X.J. Kennedy
Premise/plot: Where I Live is a poetry collection edited by Paul B. Janeczko. The poems are gathered together into three sections, "Home," "Street," and "Town." Each poem is illustrated. Many poems celebrate the ordinary, the little moments that make up life.
My thoughts: Poetry collections are interesting. I always find a few to love. I rarely love them one and all. Such is the case with this new collection. There were a handful of poems that I definitely enjoyed reading. I thought they worked really well. I could see using them in the classroom, sharing them with young ones.
One of my favorite visual poems is by Nicholas Virgilio.
"Now the swing is still:
a suspended tire
centers the autumn moon."
The illustration shows a tire swing with a centered moon. It's a beautiful image.
I loved Ice Cream Truck by Irene Latham
On summer Mondays
we listen
for the jinglesong
that holds
half notes
of winter:
fudgesicle
orangesicle
pushpop
bombpop
firecracker
snowball
and ice cream
on a stick
that drips
unless
your tongue
is swift
like mine.
The Walk
Crunching my boots
through another snowstorm,
each footprint a temporary tattoo
against the frosted prairie.
~ Charles Waters… (more)
East side, West side,
all around the town.
Which side
is the best side?
Wherever you sit down
to eat your supper, pet your cat,
do homework, watch TV.
Any old place
that's your home base
is where you want to be.
X.J. Kennedy
Premise/plot: Where I Live is a poetry collection edited by Paul B. Janeczko. The poems are gathered together into three sections, "Home," "Street," and "Town." Each poem is illustrated. Many poems celebrate the ordinary, the little moments that make up life.
My thoughts: Poetry collections are interesting. I always find a few to love. I rarely love them one and all. Such is the case with this new collection. There were a handful of poems that I definitely enjoyed reading. I thought they worked really well. I could see using them in the classroom, sharing them with young ones.
One of my favorite visual poems is by Nicholas Virgilio.
"Now the swing is still:
a suspended tire
centers the autumn moon."
The illustration shows a tire swing with a centered moon. It's a beautiful image.
I loved Ice Cream Truck by Irene Latham
On summer Mondays
we listen
for the jinglesong
that holds
half notes
of winter:
fudgesicle
orangesicle
pushpop
bombpop
firecracker
snowball
and ice cream
on a stick
that drips
unless
your tongue
is swift
like mine.
The Walk
Crunching my boots
through another snowstorm,
each footprint a temporary tattoo
against the frosted prairie.
~ Charles Waters… (more)
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Statistics
- Works
- 53
- Also by
- 1
- Members
- 5,056
- Popularity
- #4,951
- Rating
- 4.0
- Reviews
- 365
- ISBNs
- 145
- Languages
- 2
- Favorited
- 1
Idependent reading grade 2-5