Children's Literature

AFRICAN AMERICAN POETRY

My Man Blue: Poems

Grimes, Nikki. My Man Blue: Poems. Illustrated by Jerome Lagarrigue. New York: Dial Books for Young Readers, 1999.
ISBN: 0-8037-2326-1

My Man Blue: Poems, shares the story of Damon, a young boy whose father is gone.  He has moved with his mother and meets his mother’s old friend, Blue.  Each poem seems to be Damon, telling his own story.  The poems all have a rhythmic quality without having any sort of rhyming pattern.  Grimes has used some similes and metaphors to help create imagery, but the majority of the poems are free verse.

This story will be familiar to many children, fears and friends, loss and gain, friendship and bullying.  The underlying storyline shows how Damon’s friendship with Blue helps him learn how to handle stress, fear, and anger.  These poems show how Blue helps Damon grow up.  For example, in “Grounded,” Damon is angry because his asthma has kept him from playing ball.  His friend, Blue, shares a hotdog with the works and shows him this is a better use of his mouth than complaining and “the perfect cure for disappointment.”

Each poem has its own page, with facing pages containing illustrations that truly help tell the story.  Lagarrigue’s illustrations are a bit dark in color, but they beautifully show the words of the poetry using pictures.

My Man Blue: Poems, does not contain a table of contents, but the poems almost seem sequential, rendering a table of contents unnecessary.  The poems can stand alone, but, as a whole, the poems have more impact.

FEARLESS

by Nikki Grimes

One weekend Blue and me

We storm the park.

I kill time kicking rocks

along the path

while Blue scouts out a tall

and sturdy tree

And urges me to loop

my fear like twine

around a branch and use

the rope to climb.

(Fear’s useless otherwise.”

Blue says to me)

“You know I’ll be right here

In case you fall.”

Believing that is all

it takes to send

me scrambling toward the clouds

the sun, the sky.

            Hey! Climbing’s no big deal –

            Next time, I’ll fly!

Ask students:

Have you ever been afraid to do something?

What did you do to get beyond that fear?

Read the poem aloud to students, asking them listen for ways the author shows the setting.

Follow-up:

Ask students to brainstorm things that children might be afraid of; by not focusing this writing on their own fears, they may feel less intimidated.

            In pairs, have students write a poem about a childhood fear that is overcome.