Paint Me Like I Am: Teen Poems from Writerscorps

Bill Aguado, Richard Newirth. Harper Teen, $8.99 (144pp) ISBN 978-0-06-447264-7

Nikki Giovanni provides the foreword, adolescents from San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and the Bronx, the verse-in Paint Me Like I Am: Teen Poems from WritersCorps. ""Why don't you paint me/ Like I am?"" begins Delia Garcia's title poem. ""Paint me happy,/ Laughing, running down a path of happiness/ Paint me with a smile on my face."" An inspirational quote and a suggested tip or exercise (""Write as if you were in your favorite month or the month your birthday is in"") introduce each of the volume's seven sections.

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