Poetry Friday: John Prine

"Eat a lot of peaches" is my code phrase for "remember the good stuff." How do you remind yourself?


Spanish Pipedream (aka Blow Up Your TV)
lyrics by John Prine

She was a level-headed dancer on the road to alcohol
And I was just a soldier on my way to Montreal
Well she pressed her chest against me
About the time the juke box broke
Yeah, she gave me a peck on the back of the neck
And these are the words she spoke

Chorus:
Blow up your T.V. throw away your paper
Go to the country, build you a home
Plant a little garden, eat a lot of peaches
Try an' find Jesus on your own

All of it here

YouTube: Prine singing Spanish Pipedream in concert

Song notes (taken from the lyrics link above. I don't know if these are accurate.)

---"I wrote it for a Puerto Rican dishwasher in Chicago 'cause he liked Spanish songs." ~John Prine London, Aug 8, 1976

---"I used to keep a small bowl of real fine pebbles that I picked up on my mail route, and if somebody said something really stupid on TV, I'd throw some at the screen." ~John Prine

Poetry Friday is hosted today by Two Writing Teachers

Your Name in Shoes

I think this is funny. Type in a woman's name at Zappos.com and see what shoe styles come up.

Alexis (identity issues.)

Gertrude is plainly a bootie and nothing else.

Fanny (who you might have expected to have bootie) is eccentric and fun.

Pippi isn't so Longstocking, but the clogs are cute.

Sara vs. Sarah. (hmmm. My spelling, "Sara," returns no loafers, thank goodness. But I kind of envy those "Sarah" Shane&Shawn racy numbers.)

I'm very sorry. More about writing next time.

Oh, wait! Shoes you can write on. Whew! I'm back on message.

Why I Write Middle Grade Fiction

Two things have been going on:

the revisions for my second middle grade novel, The New Recruit, which must be put to bed by mid-November or so

the slow drafting of an unnamed YA novel

But...then another thing happened. In the midst of the revisions, I suddenly wanted to write another middle grade novel really badly. Not that I want to stop with the YA. But I realized how much I love middle grade. I think it was this definition from the Cybils that did me in:

"The middle grade years are, in my view, the reading years with the most potential to turn a child into a reader for life. It's often the books you read between the ages of 8-12 that you remember long into adulthood as your dearest books of all. These are the years when kids really and truly start to figure themselves out as readers--their likes and dislikes and all the rest in between. It's during this time when children strike out on their own in earnest, reading for themselves and by themselves, all the while creating themselves.

In this Cybils category, we're looking for stories that capture real life in all of its wonderful messiness. So we're not talking magic or superheroes or werewolves or elves. Instead, think adventures and school stories, mysteries and stories about families, and tales that tell kids of life across the globe. Tell us which of the Middle Grade fiction titles published this year you think kids will still be talking about when they're all grown up, and still reading away."

--Kerry Millar, organizer

Nominations are open! Go quickly and nominate your favorite middle grade book!

Or once in any of these nine categories.