G3: Footprints on the Roof: Poems about the Earth

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Singer, Marilyn. 2002. FOOTPRINTS ON THE ROOF: POEMS ABOUT THE EARTH. Ill. by Meilo So. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN: 0-375-91094-8.

The 19 poems in this slim yet powerful collection all focus on topics associated with nature. Nature may appear as a phenomenon to be described, appreciated and sometimes humanized, as in the poems entitled “Go-Betweens,” “Summer Solstice,” “Prehistoric Praise,” “Dormant Dragons,” “Caves” or “Dunes.” The other poems in the collection remind readers of their interactions with nature and feature first- and second person perspectives and musings on their surroundings. Each poem is given its own two-page spread, with ample white space and a readable font. The ink illustrations always appear on the right page of the spread, but, in approximately half of the poems, they cover all or parts of both pages.

CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Singer’s straightforward vocabulary, clear imagery, variety in forms and use of topical twists provide for a work that readers at many levels could enjoy. Though younger, less experienced readers may not be able to comprehend the poems independently, they would easily be able to enjoy the poems if someone were to read them aloud and discuss them. Meilo So’s stylized, brush-stroked illustrations of the “critical moment” in each poem would also enable understanding, at least of the larger topics and themes.

Singer uses different formalistic elements to make her poems accessible. Generally, the poems are all in free verse, though she does incorporate subtle rhyming in “Summer Solstice” or “Dormant Dragons,” for example. The way she uses it, free verse allows for the reader to focus on the next image or line, instead of getting pulled into determining the rhyme or rhythm of the poems. When she does use rhymes, they are barely noticeable, often with words that may be anywhere from two to five lines apart. Complementing the free verse and acting as a substitute for commas and periods, she also breaks lines into words and phrases and indents them at different points in all of the poems. By showcasing her lines in this manner, she is almost telling readers to slow down and mull over a certain image or phrase before moving on to the rest of the poem. Colons and “long dashes” (“M” dashes?) are about the only punctuation she employs, giving the poems the contradictory feeling of flowing freely and meandering to their main points.

Another noteworthy aspect of her poetry is her use of repetition of words and phrases and parallelism of grammatical structures. In “Natural Disasters,” she begins with “We were talking disasters” and follows that with a participle to elaborate on what was occurring at that moment in time. Later in the poem, after using similar grammatical structures to list different types of disasters, she repeats the line, “We were talking disasters” with the same elaborative participle. In “Mud,” the narrator shows her longing for nature after staying for awhile in the city. She sets her goal, “I’m in the mood for mud,” and then fronts three lines with “When” clauses to show three unnatural aspects of the city life for her. Her use of “Then” at the end of the poem could be considered a completion of the repetition, a way for the narrator to show her resolve and find nature in the city. Singer also does the same in “Fens” with the repeated phrase “those (adjective) places.” Readers see fens as mysterious places and are left to wonder why the narrator sees them as so inviting. “Desert” is also an exceptional example of her ease in employing this technique.

Alliteration and hyperbole play a role in many of the poems in this book, but, like the rhyming, they are used with restraint. Animal and reptile burrows are “mazy metropolises” (in “Burrows”—an excellent poem, by the way), and the thought of “Volcanoes venting” is scary. For hyperbole, “Dining Out” begins, “Each day I eat the earth/I drink the rain,” impossible to do on the surface, but then Singer explains in “smaller” terms how the earth sustains and entertains all of us.

A final feature worth noting is how Singer “twists” the ending of each poem. In “Winter Solstice,” the twist begins in the middle of the poem with a transition from the northern to southern hemisphere. This is actually one of her longer twists. “Caves” spends most of the poems describing features of, well, caves and ends with the idea that language is “culturally” specific: “and there are twenty words for darkness/but none at all/for light.” Throughout “Patience,” the narrator is wistful about she didn’t become “taller,” “braver,” or “wiser” after visiting the mountains, but she has become “more patient/in the mountains/And I can wait.” The trees in “Go-Betweens” accomplish a list of functions (another deft use of parallelism and repetition) throughout the poem, their “work” that “never seems like work at all.” While this practice is not unique to Singer, it does serve to make these poems more memorable and worth reading again and again.

Spare in words, focused in image, and direct in their discourse, the poems in this book and their accompanying Asian-inspired illustrations comprise a fine set of meditations on nature and our place in it.

REVIEW EXCERPT(S)
--Singer and So have created a work of minimalist art, in which harmony is achieved between text and image with no extraneous words or strokes. A welcome addition to nature-poetry collections (SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL, May 2002)
--Meilo So's illustrations, rendered in India ink on rice paper, evoke the serene quality of Japanese silkscreen. (PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, March 2002)
--The poems in Singer's latest collection are deeply earnest celebrations of the natural world… So's fluid, childlike watercolors might suggest an elementary audience, but middle-school and teen writers will probably enjoy this book the most. (BOOKLIST, March 2002)
--The poems are sometimes dry and sometimes didactic, but most are straightforward and occasionally giddy. So's art is by turns whimsical, wild, or reticent. (KIRKUS REVIEWS, January 2002)
--The book's format is polished and attractive, with its narrow creamy pages and artistic but readable font…(and) So's ink illustrations show an astonishing variety of textures, from precise tracery to glimmering gray washes, throughout evincing a dash and naturalness that usefully complement the poetry. (BULLETIN OF THE CENTER FOR CHILDREN’S BOOKS, July/August 2002)

CONNECTIONS
--FOOTPRINTS ON THE ROOF would be an excellent resource for use in language arts classes to examine the poems by themselves or to compare them with other poems dwelling on nature. It would also be useful to supplement topics in science classes.
--Meilo So’s illustrations could be used in visual arts classes as models for their simplicity and beauty or to show how to illustrate literature.
--Other mixed-age books of poetry by Marilyn Singer:
MIRROR MIRROR: A BOOK OF REVERSIBLE VERSE. 2010. ISBN: 978-0525479017
CENTRAL HEATING: BOOKS ABOUT FIRE AND WARMTH. 2005. ISBN: 978-0375829123