Where I'm From

Where I'm From

I am from haircuts, 

from barbecues and backyard parties. 

I am from the heat of the valleys.

(Hot, like potatoes in a pot.) 

I am from the persimmon tree

the orange tree

whose shade would be

what protected me.

I'm from lunch after church, 

from the stairs we would perch. 

I'm from the sit stills

and the wrinkly bills, 

from sit down and eat your fill! 

I'm from sing your song

when you go on

and not practice all along.

I'm from signs that say yield and large green fields, 

strawberries and broccoli at times. 

From the waves on the shore 

to the birds that would soar, 

the mountains we would climb up night.

Remember the days

of the team, 

the days

we would get some ice cream. 

Till I wake up--

felling distraught --

realizing it was just another dream.

Analysis:

Looking at George Ellen Lyon's poem, "Where I'm From" we can see that she divides her poem into four stanzas. Three that describe elements of her upbringing and a final stanza that leaves the reader questioning what she meant in her final stanza. In my poem I tried my best to follow George Ellen Lyon's format however try to add words that would time well together. In the first stanza I wrote:

I am from haircuts,
from barbecues and backyard parties.
I am from the heat of the valleys.
(Hot, like potatoes in a pot.)
I am from the persimmon tree
the orange tree
whose shade would be
what protected me.

In this stanza I talk about some of the things I distinctly remember from the first house I lived in when I was young. I remember the haircuts my grandpa would always take me to and the get-togethers we would have with family and friends. I remember the heat during the summers getting to almost 100 degrees and always getting french fries at McDonald's. I remember the huge trees we had in our backyard (well I thought they were big at the time) and the fruits that hung from them. It was a happy childhood. In the second stanza I said:

I'm from lunch after church,
from the stairs we would perch.
I'm from the sit stills
and the wrinkly bills,
from sit down and eat your fill!
I'm from sing your song
when you go on
and not practice all along.

This stanza focus more about my my childhood at church. It was a church that a lot of my family went to (uncles, aunts, cousins, and my grandma). I remember they would always have food after church to eat and sometimes we would sit on the stairs after and watch the older kids play basketball in the parking lot. I talked about how my parents would tell me to sit still during the sermons and remember the wrinkly one dollar bills that would be put into the offerings bag. I especially remember this one time at church the kids were going to put on a show for the whole church and I was given a part to sing during it. The only thing was I didn't practice my song at all before going on stage. Oops. The third stanza goes like this:

I'm from signs that say yield and large green fields,
strawberries and broccoli at times.
From the waves on the shore
to the birds that would soar,
the mountains we would climb up night.

When I got a little older I moved into my second house and I focused more on describing that area in this stanza. This area was beautiful, it had large fields where you were able to see the whole sky! Fields that were full of all kinds of fruits of vegetables, mainly strawberry but sometimes I'd see some broccoli there too. We weren't to far to the beach too probably like twenty minutes away. Although we lived close to mountains too so we could go hiking if we wanted to. In the final stanza, I wrote:

Remember the days
of the team,
the days
we would get some ice cream.
Till I wake up--
felling distraught --
realizing it was just another dream.

I tried to copy how George Ellen Lyon and how she used the last one more as a way to reminisce and create a vivid image. So I talked about how all the previous stanzas are just memories in the past. I made this stanza seem like I was in my bed dreaming then waking up and realizing that's it was all a dream.