My Love Affair With Poetry

Began When I Was a Child

Falling for Poetry

I first became smitten with poetry as a young teenager in a family of eight. Once my homework was complete and chores were finished - as the eldest, most chores fell to me - I would sneak off to the bedroom I shared with my sister, Jeanne, and read a book. Both my parents loved reading and bestowed that delight upon me. So I read everything that intrigued me.

The Green Leaf and the Gray

The first book of poems I picked out of my mom’s shelf was called The Green Leaf and The Gray by J.P. Irvine. It was published in 1891. Even though the language seemed a bit stilted to me, I enjoyed the topics, the rhythm and the rhymes.

Here’s one I enjoyed:

Jo Leeper

Forty years ago, or nigh,

Barefoot boys were Jo and I.

I a child and he a child,

Here, when all the grove was wild;

Played together every day -

In the straw rick, in the hay;

Hunted birds’ eggs, went to school,

And a-swimming in the cool,

Deep, delicious willow pool, -

Now dried up, with just the stumps

To show where grew the willow clumps.

There’s change! The creek sinks in its bed;

I am tired and Jo is dead.

Inspirational to a Teenager

No child’s fare was this. I had already graduated myself to adult novels by the time I hit my early teens. My parents did not censor anything I read because they knew that I had the temperament to handle real life. My grandmother once burned one of my Nancy Drew mysteries but after that I learned not to leave my books on the dining room table where she could find them when she paid us a visit.

The Green Leaf and the Gray inspired me to write some poems of my own. It was a great way to spill my teenage angst onto paper and release it from my soul.

I started carrying notebooks around with me so I could jot down my thoughts into poems and even doodle a little. The notebook also served as a way of avoiding eye contact with unwanted male interlopers. It became a protective device and quite effective.

I never dated anyone in high school due to shyness but also because I preferred the company of my books and the poems that came to me. In retrospect, if I HAD dated anyone, fallen in love or otherwise gotten trapped into some kind of a relationship back there in Michigan, I might never have arrived at the place where I am today, a creative woman enjoying life to the fullest in San Diego, California with a wonderful husband.

And Now

Those poems were my transportation to an amazing life. I have revisited some of them and even made songs of them. One of my favorites is this one:

Maraschino Blooms

Enjoy life,

Stay elevated!

Love,

Patty