On the 19th Day of Verse Love - Write and Then Offer a Title That Throws the Poem in a Different Direction

 I am unsure how this one will translate, but on Tuesday night my students worked through Body Biographies, and I modeled with Kwame Alexander's The Door of No Return. In my drawing of a young boy kidnapped into slavery, I was working on the chest and noted, "I don't think I've ever drawn a nipple before," imagining that a youth would unlikely have a top. 

This, of course, sent me back to Roskilde, Denmark, where in 2004, Tiana French and I were chaperones, and it is true we played made-up Danish Scrabble in the evenings, often laughing at the words we made up. We also came to the conclusion that a lot of Danish names were body organs pronounced with Nordic accents. Of course, when we came to nipple (NI-PULL), we had a conversation of why do men have nipples which was turned into a book by individuals we've never met. Alas, a poem was born.

This morning, reflecting on yesterday's poem, I am also realizing how that was a transitional year, before technology really took a hold on youth cultures. Shoot. Almost 20-years ago. Sadly, too, so many of the teachers who mentored us have passed away. And so...and so...and so....