The Blizzard Voices by Ted Kooser

April is National Poetry Month. I read poems all the time because I write poems. I believe you can't write what you don't read. I tried to read even more poems this month. Ted Kooser is a favorite poet of mine because I believe in his philosophy that a good poem is one that you can understand.

I had The Blizzard Voices sitting here for almost a month before I finally read it today. I put it off because I knew it was going to be sad. I was right. The Blizzard of 1888, also known as The Schoolchildren's Blizzard, took many lives. I had read about it before, but Kooser puts words in the mouths of the survivors and it is tear making. People lost arms and legs, animals died, children stayed in the schoolhouses because they couldn't see three feet in front of their faces to find their way home across the wide open prairie. There were the brave and the foolish. A very sad time that proves what we all know, nature has no concern for us, and we shouldn't expect it.

This book of poetry is understandable and lovely. It reads in about a half hour but will stay with you for ages.