1. “Hesse uses free-verse poems to advance the plot, allowing the narrator to speak for herself much more eloquently than would be possible in standard prose…The story is bleak, but Hesse’s writing transcends the gloom…during the dust storms of the 1930s…” taken from reviews of the book

2. A few classic photographs of the 1930s dust bowl
Be sure to look at and read the Afterwords at the end of the book. You could do this before you begin the book too…either way will work.

3. The Grapes of Wrath is an American novel by John Steinbeck centered on the Dust Bowl and the Joad family. Published in 1939, the book won the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and it was cited prominently when Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962. 
“A large drop of sun lingered on the horizon and then dripped over and was gone, and the sky was brilliant over the spot where it had gone, and a torn cloud, like a bloody rag, hung over the spot of its going. And dusk crept over the sky from the eastern horizon, and darkness crept over the land from the east.” 
“Muscles aching to work, minds aching to create - this is man.”  ― John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

4. The next 8 slides are arranged with an excerpt from the first and last poems of each section (in the tinted box) and an invitation to write your own poem. Each slide also lists the poem titles (i.e. chapter titles) for the section.
Then you are prompted to do some review and sharing with your group. After seeing how this works, you may want to divide the poems among the group before you read each section so anyone who wants to be choosing lines to share can do that as they read.
This is an engaging book about events that really happened.
Imagine you are Billie Jo as you follow her story in her poetic voice.
Please submit your poems on Google docs or in paper format to one of the teachers. Hopefully, some can be published next year in Creeks and Currents. Refer to your poetry editing handout as you write.

5. Mr. Hardly’s Money Handling Fifty Miles South of Home Rules of Dining
From Beginning: August 1920
Daddy named me Billie Jo.
He wanted a boy.
Instead,
He got a long-legged girl
With a wide mouth
And cheekbones like bicycle handles…
and a hunger for playing fierce piano.
From Fields of Flashing Light
The wind snatched that snow right off the fields,
leaving behind a sea of dust,
waves and
waves of
dust,
rippling across our yard…
If he[Daddy] had cried,
his tears would have been mud too,
but he didn’t cry.
And neither did Ma
Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section. One describes a person, the other a scene.
What specific things does poetry do that makes each image so strong? Consider diction as well as structure of the piece.
Modeling on either (or each) section, write a poetic description(s) of a person or scene.
Divide the other 15 poems among the group and find and share lines you like best from each and tell why.
Winter, 1934
Beginning: August 1920
Rabbit Battles
Losing Livie
Me and Mad Dog
Permission to Play
On Stage
Birthday for F. D. R.
Not Too Much to Ask
Mr. Hardly’s Money Handling
Fifty Miles South of Home
Rules of Dining
Breaking Drought
Dazzled
Debts
Foul as Maggoty Stew
State Tests
Fields of Flashing Light

6. Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
From Tested by Dust
I hope we get bonus points
for testing in dust
From On the Road with Arley
Here’s the way I figure it.
My place in the world is at the piano…
The money doesn’t matter much to me.
I’d play for nothing…
We are flying down the road…
laying our voices on top of the beat…
It’s being part of all that…
being somewhere new and interesting.
We have a fine time.
Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
This is another chance for a quick model poem from you.
Write a two line “I hope” poem. Try to use some interesting diction. Or write a “My place in the world is…” modeling on the lines of Billie Jo’s poem.
Divide the other 9 poems among the group and find and share lines you like best from each and tell why they are effective.
Spring, 1934
Tested by Dust
Banks
Beat Wheat
Give Up on Wheat
What I Don’t Know
Apple Blossoms
World War
Apples
Dust and Rain
Harvest
On the Road with Arley

7. Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
From Hope in a Drizzle
She has nothing to say to anyone anymore,
except how she aches for rain,
at breakfast,
at dinner,
all day,
all night,
she aches for rain.
From The Path of Our Sorrow
Such a sorrow doesn’t come suddenly
there are a thousand steps to take
before you get there.
But now,
sorrow climbs up our front steps,
big as Texas…
Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
The first one uses a repetitive rhythm which is often effective in poetry and in speeches. Think Dr. Martin Luther King. Try your hand at this. What do you ache (wish, long) for? Use rhythm to your advantage as you write.
The last poem is a historic capsule of what led to the catastrophe of the Dust Bowl. Poetic summaries of news or history have been used for millennia. Think of something from NEWSELA that is important to you and try to write it modeled on what Mrs. Freeland told the class pp
Divide the other 9 poems among the group and find and share lines you like best from each and tell why.
Summer, 1934
Hope in a Drizzle
Dionne Quintuplets
Wild Boy of the Road
The Accident
Burns
Nightmare
A Tent of Pain
Drinking
Devoured
Blame
Birthday
Roots
The Empty Spaces
The Hole
Kilauea
Boxes
Night Bloomer
The Path of Our Sorrow

8. Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
From Hired Work
It’s hard to believe I once brought money in too,
For playing piano
Now I can’t hardly stay in the same room with one.
Especially Ma’s.
From Art Exhibit
I feel such a hunger
to see such things.
And such an anger
because I can’t.
Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
These show loss, frustration, anger. How would you write a short poem about this? Try it.
Divide the other 5 poems among the group and find and share lines you like best from each and tell why.
Autumn, 1934
Hired Work
Almost Rain
Those Hands
Real Snow
Dance Revue
Mad Dog’s Tale
Art Exhibit

9. Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
One is a wishing and longing poem and the other is a “keeping on keeping on” Write your own I Wish poem or else a Now I See poem. You can find many models for writing here and on other sites.
Divide the other 23 poems among the group and find and share lines you like best from each and tell why. This is quite a load of poems; good thing you are becoming skilled at this sharing.
Winter, 1935
State Tests Again
Christmas Dinner Without the Cranberry Sauce
Driving the Cows
First Rain
Haydon P. Nye
Scrubbing Up Dust
Outlined by Dust
The President’s Ball
Lunch
Guests
Family School
Birth
Time to Go
Something Sweet from Moonshine
Dreams
The Competition
The Piano Player
No Good
Snow
Night School
Dust Pneumonia
Dust Storm
Broken Promise
Motherless
Following in His Steps
From State Tests Again
Wish I could run home and tell Ma
and see her nod
and hear her say,
“I knew you could.”
It would be enough.
From Following in His Steps
Now that I see that one day
comes after another
and you get through them
one measure at a time

10. Sunday Afternoon at the Amarillo Hotel
From Heartsick
I’m so restless…
I storm up to my room…
and we don’t know how to talk anymore
if we ever did
From Old Bones
Once
dinosaurs roamed…
bones
showing
in the green shale,
ribs the size of plow blades,
hip bones like crank phones…
A chill shoots up my spine
imagining a dinosaur
slogging out of an Oklahoma sea,
with turtles swimming around its legs…
sunning itself on the swampy banks
Spring, 1935
Heartsick
Skin
Regrets
Fire on the Rails
The Mail Train
Migrants
Blankets of Black
The Visit
Freak Show
Help from Uncle Sam
Let Down
Hope
The Rain’s Gift
Hope Smothered
Sunday Afternoon at the Amarillo Hotel
Baby
Old Bones
Look at the excerpts from the first and last poems in this section.
Write a restlessness poem or else an imagining poem.
Or…titles are important in hooking a reader in. Look at these titles; pick one and write a short poem (not related to Billie Jo’s story…just whatever you want).
Divide the other 16 poems among the group and find and share lines you like best from each and tell why.

11. Something Lost, Something Gained
From The Dream
I play songs
that have only the pattern
of my self in them…
You are the
companion
to myself.
The mirror
with my mother’s eyes
From Met
As we walk together,
side by side,
in the swell of dust
I am forgiving him, step by step…
side by side
I am forgiving myself…
These are excerpts for the first and last poems in this section. How do they make you feel?
Look at the whole poem, The Dream, pp 193-4, and talk about the arrangement of the lines. Why might the poet have done this?
“The Dream” is a poem of address, an ode. The person, Billie Jo, is speaking to (praising) the piano. This is an often-used and effective format in both serious and humorous poetry. Try it sometime.
Divide the final 9 poems among yourselves (includes the last one this time) sharing lines you love and why you chose them.
Summer, 1935
The Dream
Midnight Truth
Out of the Dust
Gone West
Something Lost, Something Gained
Homeward Bound
Met

12. I dreamed of running off too, though I never did
From Cut It Deep
I dreamed of running off too,
though I never did
I didn’t have half your sauce, Billie Jo, he says.
And it’s the first time I ever knew
there was so much to the two of us…
From Finding a Way
And I’m learning, watching Daddy, that you can stay
in one place
and still grow
Lots of information and memory is packed into these last poems.
The model to write from could be “I dreamed…” or “And I’m learning…”
Again, divide the final 9 poems (including Finding a Way) among the group sharing best lines and why you like them.
Autumn, 1935
Cut It Deep
The Other Woman
Not Everywhere
My Life, or What I Told Louise
After the Tenth Time She Came to Dinner
November Dust
Thanksgiving List
Music
Teamwork
Finding a Way

13. As is everything Ken Burns does, this is excellent and well worth digging into.
I’ve also included a link to Shmoop, which leaves no stone unturned when it comes to learning about literature and many other things.

14. How is Langston Hughes’ famous poem like and how different from Billie Jo’s story and the Okie migrants’ stories?