DARK EMPEROR & OTHER POEMS OF THE NIGHT, by Joyce Sidman

Quick Facts:
- illustrated by Rick Allen
- poetry
- collection
- Newbery Honor Book

"Dark Emperor & Other Poems of the Night" is a collection of poems linked by the theme of what happens in nature after the sun goes down. The poems are organized in a natural progression, beginning (appropriately) with "Welcome to the Night" and ending with "Moon's Lament", which reflects the moons feelings about the coming dawn.

Despite their strong thematic link, each poem is distinct and self-contained enough to be enjoyed on its own. The effect of this is that the poems complement one another, rather than relying on one another. You can enjoy "Night-Spider's Advice", for example, completely on it's own. But you see it in a different light once you've read "Cricket Speaks", simply for the way in which you can imagine these two perspectives might be at sometimes fatal odds.

One of the most interesting choices author Joyce Sidman makes is to include an informational blurb with each poem, printed on the page opposite the poem. This information actually serves to support and deepen the reader's understanding of the poem, while also providing a teaching moment about nature. For example, on page 8 the poem "Snail at Moonrise" refers to a snail as "shell-maker". The informational blurb on page 9 then elaborates on this, telling the reader that young snails produce a special material that helps them add layers to their shells as they grow. By focusing the informational blurb to what is relevant to the poem, Sidman not only provides support for understanding her poems, but encourages the reader to be active in their reading of her poetry.

"Dark Emperor & Other Poems of the Night" contains many different poetry styles, each poem playing with rhyme, rhythm and sounds in different ways. For example, consider this portion of one of my favorite poems, "Ballad of the Wandering Eft":

"Come all you young efts,
so brave and so bold,
and don the bright colors
of scarlet and gold.

Step out from your puddles
to breathe the sweet air
and wander the woodlands
with hardly a care.

     For it's wild and it's windy
    way out in the woods,
    where the moss grows like candy
    and the hunting is good,
    where the rain falls from heaven
       and mud's underfoot
    It's wild and it's windy
    way out in the woods.
- "Dark Emperor & Other Poems of the Night", page 24

As is typical with ballads, it has a repeating verse (the italicized one), and uses consistent syllable patterns and rhyme to create a rhythmic flow to the poem. The poem is structured symmetrically: verse, verse, chorus, verse, verse, chorus.

Now consider "Dark Emperor". Along with having no rhyming pattern or syllabic consistency, "Dark Emperor" plays with words in a wholly different way:

The poem looks like an owl! The final verse, which references a "tiny hiccup" when considering the owl's predatory prowess looks (in contrast and placement) like a small animal about to become the owl's prey. This diversity in poetic style and structure makes "Dark Emperor & Other Poems of the Night" an excellent introduction for students to the variety of forms poetry assumes.

Finally, Rick Allen's woodcut illustrations are appropriate and support the poems not only by highlighting both the grit and beauty of nature, but by using the play of darkness against light in a way suggestive of the moon glinting through leaves:

These images support the sense that the poems give the reader of glimpsing into a familiar and yet unknown world, the effect of the woodcut style and the play with light rendering familiar images more complex then we are used to seeing them.