Roar on the Other Side: A Guide for Student Poets

For all its storied past and lofty reputation, poetry is really just the art of noticing, naming, and comparing the stuff of this world. Unlike the eye of modern science (which sees the world as a giant specimen for us to dissect), poetry fosters and nurtures life by finding wonder in the nooks and crannies of ordinary life. Suzanne Rhodes, a longtime poet and teacher, offers The Roar on the Other Side as an introductory guide to poetry for students (junior high and up). Focusing on the importance of sight and the necessity of practice, Rhodes easily communicates the joy of words to her readers and helps them see how good poetry binds all seemingly--contradictory things together. Students will emerge from this book with a good handle on the basics of writing poetry and a new appreciation for the awesome world in which we live. It covers poetic tools (similes, metaphors, figurative language, etc); forms (sonnets, haiku, syllabic verse); tricks (assonance, alliteration, rhyme); genres (lyric, narrative, epic, ballad, etc.); and exercises that encourage students to experiment more.

Our poetry writing literary guide invites readers to slow down and see the world with a poet’s attentive eye, treating ordinary moments as treasures waiting to be named and compared. This book of poetry shows how poetry nourishes life by uncovering wonder hidden in the quiet corners of daily experience. Designed for both homeschool and classroom use, our poetry journal leads junior high students and older readers into the art of writing poems. This poetry guidebook explores tools such as similes, metaphors, and other figurative language, discovering classical and modern forms, including sonnets, haiku, and syllabic verse, and mastering sound techniques like assonance, alliteration, and rhyme. Our poetry for students explores the wide landscape of poetic genres from lyric and narrative to epic and ballad. By the end, these poetry books for teens transform students with both the skills and the sense of wonder.

Suzanne Underwoods Rhodes is a widely published poet, recently named as Arkansas' Poet Laureate in 2022. She has taught creative writing for many years to all age groups--from elementary-aged children to college students to retired professionals. Her poetry collections include What a Light Thing, This Stone and The Weather of the House (Sow's Ear Press). She has also written a collection of prose meditations on everyday life, Sketches of Home (Canon Press). Recent work of hers has appeared in the Spoon River Poetry Review and the Alaska Quarterly Review. Suzanne is also working on a collaborative book with acclaimed Christian artist Carol Bomer. Suzanne lives with her husband Wayne Rhodes in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and works for Angel Flight as the director of public affairs. Together, she and Wayne have five grown children and three grandchildren.