Candy Corn: Poems

James Stevenson positively shines in Candy Corn, the third of his exquisite "corn books" after Sweet Corn and Popcorn (which won a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book Award). Each double-page spread features a different design and type style to reflect the shifting moods of his diverse and delightful poems. "Peanuts," for example, perfectly illustrates the out-of-control nature of peanut eating. The left page presents a sole peanut, "First I had this one." The adjacent page swims with peanuts, each with its own "caption": "Then I had this one. / Then I had these two / and this one / and this" and so on. "Dawn" is illustrated only by a deep blue on the left page that softens to a lighter blue on the right. And "Coming or Going" doesn't need any illustration at all:

The screen door screeches.
The screen door slams.
Coming or going,
Going or coming,
The sounds are the same.

But what a difference
It makes to me--
Your going away,
Your coming home.

The poet never misses the mark--his quiet (yet playful) observations about subjects from flowering dogwoods to paving machines have heart and integrity, as do the spare, watercolor-splashed line drawings that you might find in an artist's personal sketch book. Stevenson is a master at capturing moments, images, and emotions with the most elegant and sparing of strokes. With his appreciative eye, he shows us that we're lucky there isn't just one daisy in the world, and that "for every head there is a hat." No question, we'll be looking for the next corn book. (Ages 7 and older) --Karin Snelson