ftf, assignment 8

"Putting on fierce boots is an instant pick-me-up."

-Nina Garcia, Fashion Editor of Marie Claire as quoted in the New York Times

Chicken Parade

My illustration for Chicken Parade by Jane Yolen

ftf6

"October 8th, 1871. On this day in 1871, flames spark in the Chicago barn of Patrick and Catherine O'Leary,

gniting a 2-day blaze that kills between 200 and 300 people, destroys 17,450 buildings,

leaves 100,000 homeless and causes an estimated $200 million (in 1871 dollars; $3 billion in 2007 dollars) in damages."

FTF assignment5

That one small boy with a face like pallid cheese

And burnt-out little eyes could make a blaze
As brazen, fierce and huge, as red and gold
And zany yellow as the one that spoiled
Three thousand guineas' worth of property
And crops at Godwin's Farm on Saturday
Is frightening---as fact and metaphor:
An ordinary match intended for
The lighting of a pipe or kitchen fire
Misused may set a whole menagerie
Of flame-fanged tigers roaring hungrily.
And frightening, too, that one small boy should set
The sky on fire and choke the stars to heat
Such skinny limbs and such a little heart
Which would have been content with one warm kiss

Had there been anyone to offer this

Incendiary

by Vernon Scannell

Free Text Friday assignment4

"Reading is equivalent to thinking with someone else's head instead of with one's own."

-Arthur Schopenhauer