We are all poetry people when we are young

From the lost diary archive

May 12, 2020 (in Avon)

Leo is learning about poetry this week in home school, and he will even have to write two poems. While out for a walk, we discuss the types of poems he’s studying and suddenly he says, “What kind of poem is the one by Sean O’Casey? Where he says, ‘I often looked up at the sky/An I assed meself the question, what is the stars?’”

THIS REALLY HAPPENED. 

It shows he’s paying attention since we have up in the hall the famous poster about Irish writers, which features 12 quotations from the works of Irish writers including one from a play in verse by O'Casey. But still: My 7-year-old American son said the name ‘Sean O’Casey.’

We then went back to my parents' house to study their version of the poster (but of course, they, too, have the post of Irish writers). Truth: as often as I looked at the poster, I never actually studied the rhymes in the quotations! Never studied the meter! And there we were counting syllables in the poems. 

Literature is life. 

And...

We are all poetry people when we are young.

I don't know if he will write much more poetry in his life or if he'll write in general; he likes to draw, which even that, may wind up being simply a childhood hobby.

But what I do know is that he's at the age that predates 'I'm not into poetry.' That predates 'I'm not a poetry guy.' And: 'Who reads poetry?' And I'll aim to have him linger at this age as long as possible. Because we are all poetry people when we are young.

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