This Poetry Pairing features Rita Dove’s poem “November for Beginners” and the article “Heavy Autumn Snowstorm Barrels Across Northeast” by Al Baker, Elizabeth A. Harris and Sarah Maslin Nir.
A new Poetry Pairing appears on the first Thursday of each month. To view all the Poetry Pairings we’ve published in collaboration with the Poetry Foundation since 2010, and to find activity sheets to help with teaching them, visit our collection.
And if you are teaching with this feature, here are two activity sheets that may help:
Poem
Rita Dove was born in Akron, Ohio, in 1952. Her verse-novel “Thomas and Beulah” (1986) won the Pulitzer Prize. In 1993, Ms. Dove was named U.S. poet laureate. She was, at 40, the youngest poet to be elected to the position. She is now commonwealth professor of English at the University of Virginia.
‘November for Beginners’
By Rita Dove
Snow would be the easy
way out — that softening
sky like a sigh of relief
at finally being allowed
to yield. No dice.
We stack twigs for burning
in glistening patches
but the rain won’t give.
So we wait, breeding
mood, making music
of decline. We sit down
in the smell of the past
and rise in a light
that is already leaving.
We ache in secret,
memorizing
A gloomy line
or two of German.
When spring comes
we promise to act
the fool. Pour,
rain! Sail, wind,
with your cargo of zithers!
Times Selection Excerpt
In the article “Heavy Autumn Snowstorm Barrels Across Northeast,” Al Baker, Elizabeth A. Harris and Sarah Maslin Nir write about the October 2011 storm.
October, said the calendar. Before Halloween. And the 2.5 million trees occupying New York City’s open spaces confirmed it was fall — not winter — with glorious canopies of leaves stretching along their boughs.
Yet snow was falling. Not a light, mischievous form of frozen precipitation, either, but heavy, wet flakes driven on the gusts of an angry weather system barreling across the Northeast from the Atlantic Ocean on Saturday, cracking sturdy limbs and toppling power lines as it went. It also shattered records, threatening some more than a century old, and elicited the kinds of warnings from public officials that are not usually heard until deep in winter.
On Sunday,about 2.3 million customers from Pennsylvania reaching up into New England found themselves without electricity, according to reports, as the region was lashed by surprisingly high winds, snowdrifts and surging seas. On a weekend that might normally have been spent raking leaves, people were forced to react quickly — retrieving shovels, charging batteries, finding fuel for generators, searching for boots and mittens and checking refrigerators and cupboards.
… The conditions in Washington were so bad Saturday night that the White House interrupted its Halloween party, and President Obama comforted some children whose costumes were obscured by winter coats as they lined up at the North Portico for a treat of cookies, M&Ms and dried fruit.
“I know it’s cold here; you guys doing all right?” he asked. “It’s not ideal out here.”
He could have been speaking to a great swath of the nation.
By evening’s end, the storm, a menacing northeaster, had winds of up to 60 miles per hour and blanketed parts of New Jersey and southern New England with more than a foot of snow before it showed any signs of petering out by early Sunday. In coastal areas, shorelines battered in late August by Tropical Storm Irene’s tidal surges were readying for more flooding.
… By midday, the snowfall tallies were already threatening to break records. Roughly six inches of snow had already piled up in Lee, Mass., in the heart of the Berkshires, where gusts of winds were swirling. In Worcester, Mass., the record of 7.5 inches was set in 1979. By 7 p.m., the National Weather Service reported that 6.9 inches had fallen there, but by 11 p.m. the snow still falling hard and unabated. The forecast there was for 11 inches.
In West Milford, N.J., there were 18 inches of snow reported at 10:30 p.m. Earlier in the evening, at about 8:15 p.m., 19 inches had accumulated in Plainfield, Mass., with four or five more hours of accumulation predicted. The highest snowfall in New York State was in Orange County, where about a foot piled up, according to the National Weather Service.
By evening, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey had declared a state of emergency for the entire state. A few hours later, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo made a similar declaration for 13 counties in New York.
To view all the Poetry Pairings we’ve published in collaboration with the Poetry Foundation since 2010, and to find activity sheets to help with teaching them, visit our collection.