Poetry challenge from Anna Roseboro - Write a poem of transliteration using a piece of prose and converting it into a poem.

This poem was taken from a lengthy journal entry about ways that books throughout my life have shaped me. I took the early years of my life as my focus in order to keep the poem short – the journal entry is too long and rambling to share here, but this is my poem:

Books Shaped Me

I was blessed to be born to readers and writers.
Bedtime stories and early books shaped me.
I learned from “A Day in the Jungle” in the Bedtime Story Book that friends make us stronger.
I learned from “At the Seaside” in A Child’s Garden of Verses that the tide erases sandcastles.
I learned from Childcraft Poems and Rhymes that purple cows need friends.
I learned from “A Visit from St. Nicholas” that visions of sugarplums should keep dancing in my head.
I learned from Nancy Drew that life is a mystery.
I learned from the Boxcar children that families don’t always work out.
I learned from A Taste of Blackberries that people we love die.
I learned from the Bible that I’ll see those people again.

     -Kim Johnson