Book Review: The Way Things Are and Other Poems

Title: The Way Things Are and Other Poems

Author: Myra Cohn Livingston

Date: 1974

Publisher: Atheneum

ISBN: 0-689-50008-4

Length: 40 pages

Illustrations: line drawings by Jenni Oliver

Quote: “O, I have been walking / with a bag of potato chips, / me and potato chips / munching along.”

This is a kid-sized chapbook of kid-friendly poems: two pages of Table of Contents and 38 one-page poems, several short enough that the publisher filled in the space at the bottom of the page with a line drawing.

A few of the poems are specifically about children. “Growing: For Louis” asserts, “Oh, my mother says there's really no hurry / And I'll grow soon enough. / But it's tough being short,” and in “For Laura” the speaker says “I have grown taller.” In “Natural History Museum,” describing a museum that obviously has more human history than “natural” history, the narrator observes, “It would take a child of / ten to fit into those chairs. / And I am ten.”

Others are more about teenagers or adults. “Lonesome all alone/ Listens for the phone” is the refrain in “Lonesome.” The narrator in “Car Wash,” who says, “Car, / I give you over,” must be at least fifteen in most States. “Come, song... / Let me play you / fresh on my guitar!” presupposes a narrator with man-sized hands. “Yesterday it was great...it is gray / Today / And I am sad” describes a different kind of “Bad Day” than the one narrated in Alexander and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day.

The copy I physically own was discarded by a library after a page was torn out. A childish hand has identified the first poem, in the table of contents, as “fantasy.” The poem is short enough to quote:

“It's today,

This road,

This knowing the road is there.

A few brambles,

A few tangles,

A few scratches,

A rough stone against your toe,

But still, you've got to go

And take it.

Fast, sometimes,

Or slow,

but go--

everywhere,

anywhere

You need

to go.”

Fantasy? No, metaphor. So “The Way Things Are” might be a little too abstract for a ten-year-old reader. And several other poems, like “Lonesome,” express an interest in “friends” and popularity that belongs to high school, not middle school readers. So, ten might be too young to appreciate this book. The child who thought “The Way Things Are” was fantasy liked “Mummy,” “Bad Day,” “Ocean Dancing,” and “Dinosaurs”--not goofy or “babyish” poems, but poems that draw pictures with words, an effect bright ten-year-olds might enjoy. But I suspect that, despite the kid-pleasing absence of Teen Romance, The Way Things Are and Other Poems may be a better choice for teens than for middle schoolers.

It may be the best fit of all for the “inner children” of adult readers. Who, after all, is the one person in any classroom who most needs to be aware of how children are “thinking how to get out / Of this stuffy room...trying not to listen...thinking about...what the guys will say when / I'm up to bat and hit / A big fat home run”? The teacher, that's who. Middle school kids already know all about that sort of afternoon. Teachers need to be reminded.

Although a midlist writer while living, Myra Cohn Livingston has a small cult of fanatical fans. This book is therefore a collector's item, and this web site can offer it only for $10 per book, $5 per package (twelve books of this size per package), $1 per online payment...and Myra Cohn Livingston no longer even has a use for $1.50. The good news is that The Way Things Are will fit comfortably into a package with several books by living authors, so keep browsing for Fair Trade Books. When you buy a whole package, this web site's prices become competitive on Amazon and you encourage living writers.