Bibliographic Information
Kennedy, X.J. THE FORGETFUL WISHING WELL. Ill. by Monica Incisa. New York, NY: Athenuem.0689503172 (only original ISBN given).
Summary and Analysis
The 88 pages of poetry offered in The Forgetful Wishing Well focus on the people, hardships of growing up, and animals. Some poems focus on these ideas in real life while others are whimsical, made up ideas. The book is divided into sections: Growing Pains, Creatures, People I know, Family Matters, Wonders, In the City, and All Around the Year. Aspects are so unique in the made up scenarios or creatures that at times the poems seem to be from two extremes, which makes it all the more appealing as the reader is on a journey back and forth with reality.
Written in 1985, the poems will still entertain an audience today. Their creativity, wonder, and (for some) realism will hit upon a memory or dream for most readers. The lengths vary, which lets the reader have a break between the longer poems and most poems are brief, diverse, and alternate between rhyming and story telling. In the section of "People I Know" creative names are used to cover diverse types of people, but each poem offers similar stories.
Monica Incisa illustrated each section's title page. With sketches made of a black pen they appear both quick and thoughtful. She chose a poem from each section to illustrate, representing the whole collection. With Wonders it is a boy with a fishbowl on his head, commical,but also telling of of how reading provides nourishment to the mind of a child much like food to the fish in the fishbowl.
Highlighted Poem
Flashlight
Tucked tight in bed, the day all gone,
I like to click my flashlight on,
Then climb in under with my feet
And shine a moon out through the sheet.
I'll throw a circle on the wall,
Move close up to it, make it small,
And then yank back and make that moon
Blow up-an instant light-balloon!
Each flashlight battery, slid out,
Looks piglike with a silver snout
And like two pigs parading, they
Need to line up and look one way.
Ben Franklin with a kite and key
Attracted electricity,
But they must not be also-rans
Who put up light in little cans.
Connections
As this collection is divided in topics in which we can all relate, it would provide an opportunity for children to write a poem about different aspects of their lives. For anyone who finds poetry difficult to understand or difficult to write this would give the chance to try different approaches to writing. One never knows which type of voice they will use for creative expression until it is tried. Kennedy's poems offer the variety of expression.
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