Week 6 Discussion - Messy Room

[Prof. Sky Alton]

This week we’re reading “Messy Room” by Shel Silverstein.

Shel Silverstein was a celebrated American children’s writer. He was actually multi-talented: he started out as a popular cartoonist before becoming a writer and even turned his hand to song-writing. His poems for children are funny and heartfelt by turns.

Click here to read his poem “Messy Room”. I thought we’d end on an example of comedic poetry: there are no hard and fast rules for this type of poetry save that it’s meant to make you laugh. Here, the poet uses a list format, rhymes and a refrain (a repeated line) to really build up to the conclusion.

Feel free to share any thoughts you had while reading: how the poem made you feel, any lines that stood out or what it made you think of. You can also discuss the technical elements of the poem, like themes, images, the meter and the way the poet uses language. If someone else has said something that you find interesting, you should definitely respond to them – this is a discussion, after all.

If you get stuck, think about how the poet uses exaggeration and absurdity. Do you think it would have worked as well if he’d been writing a short story rather than a poem?

Providing what you share is respectful and HOL-appropriate, it’s completely up to you!

Your response should be at least 80 words long for full credit and must be written in your own words. While quoting from the poem is absolutely fine, you do need to write 80 words of your own content along with the quotes.

Post your responses below by 23:59 HOL-time on the 20th of August to earn 20 beans!

[Anne-Marie Gagne]

Just reading the title of the poem had me side-eyeing my own room (yes, it is a bit of a mess but a work in progress). I can tell this is mostly directed towards a younger audience and I feel like I should have had this poem painted on a wall in my room. It is probably a really good motivator for children to remember to pick their rooms up without being super harsh or even making someone feel bad about their room being messy.

“His sweater's been thrown on the floor.” oh if that isn’t me to a T. I can count three sweaters on my floor right now and it’s summer time. There is no need for these clean sweaters to be on my floor but alas that’s their home now.

“His workbook is wedged in the window,” I never wedged my books in the window but they sure did sit stacked on the floor under the window for weeks at a time when I was a child despite my bookshelf being about three feet from said window.

I love this poem and I'm kind of sad I've only now reading it.

[Janne Halla]

This is quite a hilarious poem. I think a lot of readers appreciate and see themselves as the poet (whose room this is) when reading it.

It's quite interesting what happened while reading this poem. With a lot of poems, I find that to read them 'properly', you need to slow down, use appropriate cadence and go with the rhythm.

But with this, I read it really fast, almost chaotic, which I think fits nicely with the description given to us.

I agree with Anne-Marie. This poem made me realize I need to clean my room.