Where I Live: Poems About My Home, My Street, and My Town

Sorted into three parts and featuring lines by poets and children’s book creators alike, 34 short, winning poems selected by the late Janeczko contemplate the meaning of home and belonging via a strong sense of place. In the book’s first section, “Home,” Reuben Jackson’s “Sunday Brunch” and Gary Soto’s “Ode to a Sprinkler” each revel in summers spent locally—on a porch and on neighbors’ lawns, respectively. Section two, “Street,” features Naomi Shihab Nye’s “Spruce Street, Berkeley”; Patricia Hubbell’s “Sidewalk Cracks”; and Nikki Grimes’s “Block Party,” which all consider pavement-related locales. And in the final section, “Town,” Lois Lenski’s “People” and Nikki Giovanni’s “Knoxville, Tennessee” sensorially convey neighborhood encounters. Throughout, Yum’s colored pencil and watercolor art portrays racially diverse figures in metropolitan, rural, and suburban landscapes both bustling and quiet. It’s a sights-and-sounds anthology that invites readers to observe the appreciable beauty of, as phrased by X.J. Kennedy, “wherever you sit down.” Ages 7–10. (Mar.)