Reassure Children Who Have Survived Hurricanes Katrina and Rita with Poetry

First Lady Laura Bush says that "...books have always helped many people through difficult times." Children who have experienced Hurricanes Katrina and Rita can be reassured with children's poetry. The poem "A Storm is Coming Up" in the book The Macaroon Moon hopes for a rainbow at the end.

(PRWEB) September 29, 2005 -- The insecurities caused by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita can have lasting consequences for children. One little pre-kindergarten boy whose family had fled New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina wound up in Connecticut and was asked why he was sad. His reply, muffled because his head was buried in his mothers skirt, could have come from any number of the hundreds of thousands of uprooted children who suddenly found themselves in unfamiliar territory:

"Because we lost our world."

Many young children are waking up these mornings in unfamiliar beds, unfamiliar rooms, in unfamiliar towns up to 1,000 miles from the only homes and towns they've ever known. They are looking for the familiar for comfort and one of the most familiar things to children are books.

In her opening remarks for the fifth annual National Book Festival in Washington, D.C., held on the National Mall on Saturday, September 24th, First Lady Laura Bush noted that "...books have always helped many people through difficult times." And books can be used to reassure children that it will all turn out okay in the end. Particularly childrens poetry books.

Consider the poem, "A Storm is Coming Up," by Wanda Haan (1943-2003) from her 2004 poetry book for three to eight year olds, The Macaroon Moon: A Book of Poems and Rhymes for Children. Haan was an editor at Weekly Reader for 17 years. In the last seven lines of "A Storm is Coming Up," she wrote,

The trees are shaking
Ready to bend.
My ears are full of
Sounds of the wind.
I hope a rainbow
Comes at the end.
A storm is coming up.

Haans publisher, Southfarm Press, in Middletown, Connecticut, suggests teachers and parents reading the poem to young survivors of the hurricanes use it to reassure them that their futures may indeed hold rainbows. Rainbows such as making new friends in new places.

Parents know that natural disasters can be particularly tough for younger children to handle. Children may suddenly become clingy or regress to baby-like behavior. They may be more anxious, be unable to sleep and be generally fearful. Poetry can help them.

"Rain," by Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894), may interest children now that they have survived the hurricanes:

The rain is raining all around,
It falls on field and tree,
It rains on the umbrellas here,
And on the ships at sea.

And as all young children love mud, a byproduct of hurricanes, kids will love Polly Chase Boydens poem, "Mud," found in The Random House Book of Poetry for Children. The poems were selected by Jack Prelutsky and the book published in 1983. Here are the first few lines:

Mud is very nice to feel
All squishy-squash between the toes!
Id rather wade in wiggly mud
Than smell a yellow rose.

Having experienced wind at over 100 miles an hour, poems about wind may benefit children of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The first poem below is another from The Macaroon Moon, entitled "Wind Race."

In the house,
And around the house,
Through the house, and
Above it

Blows the wind
And the winds best friend
Racing again.
They love it!

Or these same kids may identify with Ethel Romig Fullers poem, "Wind is a Cat." It begins as follows:

Wind is a cat
That prowls at night,
Now in a valley,
Now on a height,

Pouncing on houses
Till folks in their beds
Draw all the covers
Over their heads.

The complete poem is found in many anthologies of childrens poetry. Ethel Romig Fuller (1883-1965) was the Poet Laureate of Oregon in 1957.

Parents and educators themselves that lived through Hurricanes Katrina and Rita are now left to ponder the meanings of their experiences. Not only for their childrens futures and happiness, but for their own as well. Some survivors evacuated to far away states and cities are having to make decisions about whether to return to their lost homes along the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. In many cases evacuees are turning to their spiritual roots for wisdom and guidance. They are asking the question 92 year old poet Evelyn Brill Stark asks in the last poem in her 1999 book, Life Is a Poem-Often Set to Music.

I'm waiting to hear
I'm waiting to know
What you want me to do
Where you want me to go.

"All children under nine or ten years of age are poets and philosophers," according to Ernest Dimnet (1866-1954) in his book, The Art of Thinking. That's another way of saying that children are resilient for reasons science cant explain. Let us hope so. Meanwhile, expose the eight-year-old and under survivors of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita to poetry to teach them about rainbows at the end of storms.

The brief quotations of poetry included in this critical article are used for review purposes only and are copyright protected. The complete poem, "A Storm is Coming Up," is available at http://www.wandahaan.com along with suggestions on how teachers and parents can use the poem. The Macaroon Moon (ISBN: 0-913337-51-X) may be purchased at http://www.wandahaan.com/order.htm. Life Is a Poem-Often Set to Music (ISBN: 0-913337-34-X), by Evelyn Brill Stark, may be purchased from Amazon.com.

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