Dark Sky Park: Poems from the Edge of Nature

I am a teacher and bought this as a book we had to study.I’m not very keen on the poems but that is just my opinion.

Subtitled ‘Poems from the Edge of Nature’, Dark Sky Park is a wonderful selection of verse focusing on our magnificent natural world but also including the human viewpoint. Each poem encourages a closer look at the beauty of the world around us, from an intense focus on the minutae of the very smallest things, to the hugeness of the sky in the eponymous Dark Sky Park. With a particular attention on less usual animals, such as the tardigrade, worms and woodlice (few fluffy bunnies and cute penguins here!) factual and specific poems, such as Snow Leopard and Arctic Terns, are interspersed with more tangential, metaphysical works such as Moon Music and Extreme Sports – Lava-boarding.As a whole, Dark Sky Park is suitable for 9+ years, although individual poems could be used with younger ages. Factual snippets are given after most poems as footnotes, which will be a useful link for those children who love non-fiction and think that they 'don't like poetry'. From a primary school perspective, it would have been useful to have poems grouped, within chapters or in an index (e.g. forests, natural hazards, oceans) for use during topic work.The poems take a range of forms, all are enjoyable on the page but many feel made to be read aloud. The illustration throughout by Jesse Hodgson complement the text perfectly. Black pages with white writing provide particularly dramatic visuals especially for the night and deep ocean poems.Dark Sky Park is an important contribution to children's poetry, particularly with so many of our kids starved of access to the natural world. Hopefully this poetry collection will inspire young minds, to look in, to look out, to wonder and to dream. A worthy contender on the CLiPPA 2019 award shortlist.

Beautiful poems that take you on a fascinating journey into glaciers up Everest and into the tiny world of the Tardigrade. Almost all have interesting little footnotes, but work equally well without. Aleppo Cat is so very poignant without being sentimental and Ways of Conquering Everest would make a brilliant model for a workshop. Jess Hodgson's illustrations enhance but do not intrude on the poems.