Infastructure - Roads - Poetry

Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein

There is a place where the sidewalk ends
And before the street begins,
And there the grass grows soft and white,
And there the sun burns crimson bright,
And there the moon-bird rests from his flight
To cool in the peppermint wind.

Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends.

Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends. 

The kids liked this poem, we discussed the language used and looked at the theme of colour used in the poem to make descriptions, such as 'the grass grows soft and white', Oliver decided the poet was describing diseased grass and coupled with the line 'Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black and the dark street winds and bends', Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow,  the poet must be describing a place that produces the asphalt for the roads to be constructed hence the description of Asphalt flowers, the asphalt flowers being a metaphor for a description of no flowers just asphalt. where flowers should have been before mining. and the feeling that we get from the poem is that people just wanted to leave that grim mine.

The kids were very observant whilst looking at the poem and came up with the conclusion the poet was American, because of their use of the word 'Sidewalk', they also decided that the use of colour within  the poem was a great way to use rhetorical metaphors.

We then decided to go and look at what other people were saying about the poem and see what analysis others came up with.

We found that we where way off the mark in our observations about the poem, we were looking at it in a literal sense, but we were right with a couple of things those were the fact poet is American and the use of metaphors and rhetoric within the poem. It turns out the poem is about children's imaginations and how far away adults are with their imaginations, essentially telling adults to go to the place where the children know, for adults to see the world like a child, to find the joy in life that children have.

The poet in this instance is using descriptions referencing a state of mind rather than in a literal sense.

This was a great lesson in Rhetoric and Metaphors.

It always surprises me how engaged the kids get with this kind of thing, they really enjoy learning about the use of language.

There is a mission on now for them to come up with a poem of their own we have also purchased the book to have a look at his other poems, the book is aptly entitled 'Where the Sidewalk Ends' by Shel Silverstein.(click through to purchase from ebay)

Shel Silverstein also has some great educational resources to go with his writings (click here) there are games, puzzles, audio's and printable on his website for you to explore, with a wonderful poetry workshop downloadable kit, the kids are using this to help them come up with a poem of their own.