First Hop of the new year!!!

ready to hop!!

  Always nice to start the first Hop of the year!!!   Hosted by Jennifer over at Crazy for Books, this is a great way to spend tons of time online  visit blogs, discover blogs, and have a lot of fun!!   And there's a weekly question, as well --- this week's comes from Ivan:  "What book influenced or changed your life?  How did it influence/change you?"

Oooh --- good question!!!  And I had to think about what book I'd choose.  It's hard!  I mean, I could talk about Jane Yolen's book of stories, The Moon Ribbon, which I read as a kid and still love.  Or, I could talk about some classic book I read in school -- Twain, Shakespeare, etc.   But, the one that comes to my mind is a book of poetry by nikki giovanni called Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day, which I posted about a while ago.  I first found this book when I was a freshman in high school, writing in a journal (which was an English class assignment).  I had been reading poetry for a long time, but something about her poems, in this book, really struck me.  And it made me realize that poetry didn't have to be difficult to understand, or full of hidden meanings -- it could be powerful things that were simply stated.  This particular book of hers influenced not only the way that I read poetry, but also in how I wrote my own poems.  This is from the poem "Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day."   

Happy Hopping, everyone!!

I strangle my words as easily as I do my tears

I stifle my screams as frequently as I flash my smie

    it means nothing

I am cotton candy on a rainy day

    the unrealized dream of an idea unborn