#12

Weave Little Stars into My Sleep
Selected by Neil Philip
Photographs by Edward S Curtis
Clarion Books
2001
22 pages

Poetry

“This little girl
Was born to gather roses,
Wild roses.”

            This beautiful book of Native American lullabies caught my attention because not only is it a book of poetry, but it is also multicultural. The lullabies in this book reflect the concerns of mothers all over the world. Mothers rock their babies to sleep and tell them not to cry. The lullabies have been translated into English rhymes. These lullabies are originally from the Northeast (Ojibwa), the Plains (Arapaho, Kiowa, Pawnee, Crow), the Southwest (Hopi, Acoma, Yuma), the Northwest (Kwakiutl, Haida, Tsimshian), and the Arctic Indians (Inuit).

            This book has a single image cover of an Indian mother holding her baby in her arms. The endpapers and flyleaf consist of a beautiful photograph of a canoe floating in the water. Most pages have a full-page photograph, but some are smaller, so there is blank space around it. This book has the most formal text placement, where the text is opposite from the illustration. The photographs in this book are printed in sepia instead of color or black and white.

            Weave Little Stars into My Sleep is not a very well known book. My grandmother shared this book with me because it is one that she enjoyed. In the classroom, I would use this book when talking about Indians from different locations. I would probably put this book in a reading center when I taught a lesson on poetry. It is a good example of free verse poetry, along with lullabies. I could also use this book for the beautiful photographs inside when talking about Indians. Students could look at their clothing and homes to compare the different kinds of Indians. This book has not been recognized for any honors or medals. I would recommend this book of sweet lullabies to anyone with small children.