Ecphrastic Poetry Extended Project

After writing an ecphrastic poem in response to the photo of the Little Polish Boy, the students were given an assignment of finding a work, whether a photograph, painting, sculpture, monument, song, or book, and writing an ecphrastic poem based on that. There were some really great ones but the three I included were three that I could easily find the work to portray with it.

America is Too Strong by Ashley
Our nation as a whole, so strong and so bright
It was crushed to the ground by two simple flights

The losses they caused and all the sadness we shared
America is still great even though we were all scared

What wold we do, how will we take a stand
America is our big, beautiful, and bright land

We will stand strong and not let them see
The hurt, pain, and agony that left us to be

We are Americans, known to never give up
The damage that's done is not worth a million bucks

Great innocent lives were lost forever
But their memories will be here and gone never

A beautiful light stands on Ground Zero
You all are truly every American's hero

We will all still stand big and tall for our survivors and ones we lost
This is living proof to see this beautiful cross.

You Showed Us Reality by Laura
Does the world stand still in this moment?
As your flesh was torn from your bones?
As your blood curdling screams filled the air,
Did anyone hear you?
Or did they turn their heads the other way?
In this hour, no one moves, no one speaks, not a creature rushes to your side.
For you are marked as dead. I know you aren't, but child, it doesn't matter...
The famine has claimed you,
In its eager arms, I see it pulls you near,
It has promised to hold onto you.
As inhumanity's bells ring clear,
I see your woeful fate draw near.

Man Sitting Alone by Paulina
It's late
Maybe it's early

A man just walked in with his date
They must be tired, surely

They talk about what they have done
They talk about what they will do

The lights above them shine like the sun
The man behind the bar says it is two

I have no one to talk about the time with
No one to talk about the past

She left June fifth
Of the year last

Now I sit here along
At the restaurant where we met

Now my heart turns to stone
I haven't forgotten her yet

How she used to order a sundae
Every Friday

How she would giggle
At all my jokes

How her little finger used to wiggle
How she wouldn't eat her egg yokes

Her voice was soft and sweet
Like tiny silver bells

There was no stranger she wouldn't greet
No one she wouldn't wish well

She had no faults
She glowed like the morning dawn

I was like an empty vault
Cold like the morning dew on a lawn

Afraid to tell her how much I loved her
Masking my true emotion

Like a cur
I hid my devotion

Now all I can do is wait
Here with all my woes

I hope for the kindness of fate
I miss her from my head to my toes

I sit here waiting for her to come back
I'll wait here for her every day

I'll make up for all I lack
I'll wait until in my grave I lay