Leave This Song Behind

Loved this collection of poems. My 16 year old granddaughter did as well. Truly wonderful collection.

The voices in this poetry collection are incredibly raw and poignant. I cannot wait for the publication date because I would love to see this book in my classroom library in my poetry section.

Leave This Song Behind

Teen Poetry at Its Best by John Meyer, Stephanie Meyer, Adam Halwitz, Cindy Spertner

HCI Books

HCI Poetry, Teens & YA

Pub Date 26 Apr 2016

I was given a copy Of Leave This Song Behind by the publisher and their partnership with Netgalley in exchange for my honest review which is as follows:

This collection of poetry by some very talented teens deals with everything from the everyday things in life to love and loss. They take the simple things in life and turn them into something spectacular with the use of freeverse, Metaphor and Rhyme. Some of the poems in this collection deal with the loss of loved one's and break up's.

I would recommend Leave This Song Behind to anyone who appreciates good poetry, and it would make a good edition to a study on poetry for the Junior High and Highschool age group.

I give Leave This Song Behind five out of five stars

Happy Reading.

I love, love, loved this release and I am always so moved by the poetry of our youth. I am brought to such highs and lows by the feelings and the experiences they have gone through. I hope for many, many more publications as such from Teen Ink. I will be getting a copy of this for my classroom and many of my English Department colleagues as soon as I can.

I totally enjoyed reading this collection of poems from the next generation of young writers. They really show their feelings in bright shades. Whether it was sorrow, joy, jealousy, or annoyance the poets in this collection knew how to translate it to the page. My favorites were "Inverted Biology", "She", "I would like to","Write What you know", "A Letter to the Past, Present, and Future Selves" ,"A Cold","Soft", and "Confession".

“Leave This Song Behind” is a LOVELY collection of poems all written by teenagers. There is so much emotion within each one and a hidden story on each page that I thoroughly enjoyed getting to ponder.

Poems are truly a whole other language than the one we speak on a constant basis. It aids in our escape to a place only our mind will allow us to go. A place where emotions can be felt in such an extreme way that is too beautiful for any other form.

I want to thank “TEEN INK BOOK” for putting this together and sharing it with the world.
I also want to thank all the teenage authors who contributed to the book and allowed me to wander through the depth of their soul for even a short visit.

I love poems; all kinds of poems.
But the poems that bring out me, my story, my heart, my emotions, MY song, those are the ones that stick with me.

Here is a list of my top favorites in the book:
1) Year of the Dragon by Miriam Himelstein
2) Inverted Biography by Julie Yue
3) Souls Are Not Scientific by Anna Piper
4) Charcoal Boat by Callie Zimmerman
5) A Letter to the Past, Present, and Future Selves by Sofia Wesley
6) Orange Hospital Bracelet by Sophia Shelton
7) Genevieve Carnell by Moria Crowley
8) Another Poem About You and the Sink in Your Downstairs Bathroom by Angela Sabo
9) Sincerely, Perspective by Samantha Park
10) Prometheus by Eden Hartley
11) Pomegranate by Claudia Taylor
12) Don’t Fall in Love by Claire Podges
13) Knees on Neon by Sabrina Ortega-Riek
14) Soft by Mahalia Sobhani
15) Healing Old Wounds by Emily Dehr
16) The Day After by Eli Hiebart
17) One Summer by Shona Louisa Jackson
18) The Trooper by Charlotte Zaininger
19) Where Dandelions Roar by Breanna Bowers



I voluntarily reviewed an ARC of this book Via NetGalley.

This was a poetry collection that I wholeheartedly enjoyed. It is a wonderful and broad compendium of some of the fantastic teenage voices in the literary world. Full of beautiful prose and sentiment, these poems were stunningly thought-provoking and held such meaning and depth. It definitely shows the true power and significance of the written word, particularly that which comes from the mind of a young person. Each poem is so poignant and pure, which shows the beauty of the young mind. The writers have allowed themselves to enter the depths of their mind and soul, and bravely expressed what lies there.

I absolutely love how much Teen Ink encourages young people to express themselves and find their voices. Poetry—and writing in general, really—was something that helped me a great deal during my teenage years once I discovered it. It was a way to get my feelings out when I felt like I had no other option. And I always felt very thankful to be in a situation where I had a lot of support and reassurance from the people in my life in regards to my pursuit of writing. It is wonderful to see that there are some great resources to give teenagers this much needed support. I truly enjoyed my reading experience. This is an important and highly inspiring collection of words that I hope many people will read.

I have no words for how much I loved this. I'll try to do it justice and just say that had I known this book was a book, I would have purchased a long time ago. I recommend this to anyone who enjoys to read and give it a solid 4.5 stars.

Leave This Song Behind is a collection of poems that depicts different life situations teens experiences: such as depression, problems with parents, sexuality and love issues, to name a few. Teen poetry but a young adult, such as I, still can relate to some of the poems in this book.

Several of these poems that I associate myself into are: Write What You Know by Mandy Seiner; Charcoal Boat by Callie Zimmerman; A Letter to the Past, Present, and Future Selves by Sofia Wesley; and Chinese Politics (over dim sum) - Eda Tse. There are other poems that are quite remarkable, e.g., Don't Fall In Love by Claire Podges; The Sistine Closet by Hannah Livernois; and A Letter to the Past, Present, and Future Selves by Sofia Wesley.

The selection of poems in this outstanding book will leave readers ponder whether they have experienced the same situation or currently in that state, which was described in each poem. If you are into poetry, having a copy of this impressive book should not be missed.

She

She sometimes makes me want to tense the tendors on my neck and send my head smashing into my keyboard and maybe my skin and bones would, as they snapped and fractired, hit just the right keys and type a jumbed ode to beauty and wealth, forgotten forever when the circuits spark and smoke and the little copper nodes on the hard drive dig into my eyebrow and its brittle white pastic shell snaps and splinters.

Charles S. Siler

I kept going back to this particular piece of the book for maybe three days in a row....

The case with poetry is often that it's not understandable. I don' mean the language barrier I am standing if front of sometimes, but the emotional one.
I've read so much classic poetry that never really spoke to me. Leave this song behind, despite the fact it was written by teens, somehow was my type of poetry. It kind of caught me off guard, I didn't expect to read pieces about God, for example:
"I do't think I feel a God inside me. I feel uncertainty, and blood, and bones."
Do we stop questioning God once we grow older?....

This little gem of a book is the type of poerty, or modern writing I want to show my students in my attempts to inspire them to be themselves more often, or make them see they are understood. Even when they 're angry, unsure or confused.

As an attempt of a conclusion I'd like to share my other favorite piece from the book :

Food and Wine

you're burnt onto the bottom of everything I know,
like a bone , or a bad joke,
I choke you out whole, of course and wipe the blood from my mouth
pick you out of my teeth and stare emotionless and the black mess
at the bottom of the pan, take a drink from the bottle in my hand only to discover your spiits
burning the back of my throat, fermented years ago and just now opened
and it's too late
you've already intoxicated me
again, I can feel the world slowly falling away ;
fork falls to table,
glass falls to floor
in a crash splatter tinkle carpet stain and the
rest of you takes root
impossible to remove
as my poisoned frame lands
on the rug we bought together
last spring.

Leave this Song Behind is a collection of poems written by teenagers.

When I was younger, I consider myself more of a poet than a novelist. I don't know what happened why i lost my passion and so I was so excited to read this collection of poems. I read all of them in one sitting. Then I felt like something is wrong, I couldn't figure it out that I couldn't even write a review. So I reread it again because I just so love reading poems. :) This time though, I read them differently. A poem a day. Or a poem each sitting. It's a technique I usually use in reading collection of short stories and essays. Poems, not normally because they are shorter.

Anyway, I figured out what's wrong. Individually, the poems are amazing. Some will touched my heart and some blew my mind. And I didn't even think in a moment that they were written by teenagers. I got lost in some of the poems because of how beautifully written and constructed they are. Some even are eye-openers.

But here's the thing, together, the poems lost a little of their appeal. Because not all of them connect with each other. some are deep, some aren't. It's as if some of the poems were just thrown in there. So I suggest reading the each poem as an individual art not as part of a collection.

This collection of Teen Poetry by Teen Ink magazine really runs the gamut. It's organized stylistically. None of the poems are terribly long, but most have something to sink your teeth into. Not every poem is amazing, but even the iffier ones tend to have the moment of clarity when something comes into focus using unexpected words in juxtaposition. This is what really good poetry does (in my opinion), and is much harder to define than to demonstrate.

There were many poems in this book where I said something out loud in response to a silently-read poem. There is power here. Not a lot of control, yet -- but no shortage of power.

Recommended.

Leave This Song Behind: Teen Poetry at Its Best certainly lives up to its name. There is no shortage of talent here and much skill to be admired.

The teens show their ability to poignantly, humorously, or anything in between, evoke the pictures in your mind, the feelings, and the emotions they are describing or documenting. Some of these poems are quite raw, some quiet, some painful, some joyful. There is something for everyone here because poetry is, and is supposed to represent, life.

The book is divided into sections Come to Your Senses; Less is More; Get into Shape; Let Me Tell You a Story; Shall I Compare Thee to...?; I Wasn't Expecting That; and Love, Life, Death (and other overwritten themes). However, whatever the section, talent abounds.

These wise, communicative youth, fuel my hope and belief that poetry will never die out as long as someone is willing to put pen to paper and tell their unique truth in verse.

Kudos to all of them, and many thanks to NetGalley and HCI Books for allowing me to read an e-copy of this book. My review is strictly my own, unbiased reaction to this book.

Pages: 220

Genre: poetry

 

 
Synopsis
"Leave this song behind" features the best poetry from many teen writers that has contributed to Teen Ink. The topics and styles varies widely, and all the poems are divided into seven sections based on techniques and theme. In this collection is all from simple, thought-provoking poems to longer ones that paint vivid images with their carefully selected words.

My thoughts

I think there's something a lot of "adult" poets can learn from these teenagers in that not every poem in a collection needs to be about the same thing described over and over. This collection had a lot of variation, surely because the poets behind it are so different personalities and it was nice to read through the different styles and themes. It also seemed to have made the collection especially difficult to fit together, as the subject of a poem can range from death and hospital visits to more light-hearted humor in a few pages.

It wasn't always obvious that the writers were teenagers in the writing itself, most of them did a much better job than I could've and my (untrained) eyes see a lot of talent in here. But inexperience was more obvious in the subjects that were written about and, even though I'm sure I'm the same age as a lot of them, that decreased my interest some while reading.

There were some poems in here that almost made me tear up, or that communicated something to me, among a lot that didn't. All in all, this seem like a fantastic project and I'm glad it exists to encourage young poets and creativity!

It is beautiful poetry that makes you wonder what peoms would you write of teen life. Just a while ago, my daughter reminded me that I am a teenager, she might mean that I was once a teenager. A different lens to look at universal experiences.

wonderful anthology of poetry written for teens. It reflects on the many aspects of teen life which resonates with readers. Very thoughtful and deep. I enjoyed it a lot.

I enjoyed most of these poems but, it took me a little longer to read than normal. Maybe if it would’ve been more organized into related sections I wouldn’t have been a little confused on the rest of them. However, the poetry was very well written and I would read more from the majority of the poets.

Thank you HCI Books and Netgalley for this ARC.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book of poetry, written by a variety of people and many teens.
A lovely book that has encourage me to read more of this genre.