Animal ark Celebrating our wild world in poetry and pictures

In their brevity and directness, poems and photographs have much in common, Alexander points out in a note in this striking collaborative book. Sartore's up-close photographs of animals in need of protection, each elegantly set against a pure white or black background, are a plea for respect - and help. So is the spare poetry that wends through them, written in a loose haiku style and emphasizing all we humans share with animals. The words cut deep: "Remember, we are part of forever." A SONG ABOUT MYSELF Poem by John Keats. Illustrated by Chris Raschka. 40 pp. Candlewick. $17.99. (Picture book; ages 6 to 9) "There was a naughty Boy, /A naughty Boy was he." So begins a charming trifle the Romantic poet Keats included in a letter to his younger sister. With the Caldecott medalist Raschka's always enjoyable watercolor art, the puckish little poem makes an effervescent picture book. The boy has run "away to Scotland / The people for to see." Recounting the adventurous trip, he also catalogs his own wicked ways: "For nothing would he do / But scribble poetry." Be still my beating heart! BRAVO! Poems About Amazing Hispanics By Margarita Engle. Illustrated by Rafael López. 48 pp. Godwin/ Holt. $18.99. (Picture book; ages 8 to 12) López's bright portraits of notable Hispanics have the large scale and graphic discipline of poster art, while Engle manages to compress the sweep of a biography into a sharp, compact free-verse poem about each life, from childhood on. Some are famous, like César Chávez and Roberto Clemente. All faced challenges - many gut-wrenching, like Julia de Burgos's near starvation in childhood - and made lasting contributions. ONE LAST WORD Wisdom From the Harlem Renaissance Written and illustrated by Nikki Grimes and others. 119 pp. Bloomsbury. $18.99. (Ages 8 and up) Using the playful "golden shovel" form - a chunk of an older poem anchors a new poem, with one word from the old ending each line of the new - Grimes pays tribute to Harlem Renaissance poets like Langston Hughes and Gwendolyn Bennett. Her haunting poems echo and update the earlier poets' themes of struggle, resistance and pride in the face of prejudice. Gorgeous works by 15 black artists, including Javaka Steptoe, the 2017 Caldecott medalist, add to the book's dazzle. OUT OF WONDER By Kwame Alexander, with Chris Colderley and Marjory Wentworth. Illustrated by Ekua Holmes. 32 pp. Candlewick. $16.99. (Middle grade; 8 and up) Any young poet will be heartened by Alexander's reminder that "sometimes our poems sound like they were written by our favorite poets, and that is O.K." The three authors take turns emulating their idols, who include Emily Dickinson, Billy Collins and Terrance Hayes ("Make a paint box out of letters," that poem begins). Complementing the infectious mood of tribute is the spirited mixed-media artwork by Holmes ("Voice of Freedom"), a harmonious riot of color, texture and pattern. ONLINE An expanded visual presentation of this week's column at nytimes.com/books.

The world's threatened species are celebrated in gorgeously hued photos and haiku in this engaging informational picture book. Photographer Joel Sartore, working with National Geographic Photo Ark, is attempting to photograph every captive species, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, and insects, to inspire people to save them. Full-color photographs show species alone or in groups on full- or double-page spreads. Three gatefolds display species in smaller portraits, labeled to indicate their risk of extinction. Newbery medalist Alexander's haiku leaps across the pages to express through poetry what Sartore does with images. Variations in font size, color, and placement on the page emphasizes each haiku's meaning, which, purposely, doesn't always align with traditional haiku syllable form (an author's note explains further). Sartore's eye-catching photographs, accompanied by Alexander's poetry ­most notably the multistanza Chorus of Creatures ­movingly affirms that our actions matter and may lead readers to endeavor to help save these endangered species.--Rawlins, Sharon Copyright 2017 Booklist

Sartore, founder of the Photo Ark project-which aims to photograph every animal in captivity amid threats facing many creatures across the globe-teams up with Newbery Medalist Alexander and collaborating writers Hess and Nikaido to provide an up-close look at dozens of animals, in poetry and photographs. Haiku is the form of choice for the poems, though the writers play loose with syllable counts. Most animals get their own poems ("homes of courage/ on humble backs/ this is not a race," reads one, as four ploughshare tortoises sit side by side against a white backdrop), though some poems reference multiple creatures. At several points, full-page gatefolds expand to accommodate many more of Sartore's photographs, as well as a multistanza poem titled "Chorus of Creatures." Unfortunately, there's a lingering sense of a mismatch between the scope of the project and the format of the book. The grids of images on the foldout pages hardly do justice to the striking detail in Sartore's photos, and the discursiveness of the longer poem clashes with the brevity of the three-line poems appearing throughout. Ages 4-8. (Feb.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.