Breakfast Pear
Photo by Amy LV
Reading by Amy LV
Song by Gart Westerhout
Students - Happy New Year! I am finally back after a lovely holiday filled with visitors and visiting and so much food. I hope that your January is off to a warm and cozy start, and I wish you so much goodness as we make another trip around the sun together.
While you can always hear me reading a poem as above, today I am happy to also share my friend Gart Westerhout's lovely musical version of "Words Live On." Gart is a professor, composer, and director of a musical theater in Japan, and I am grateful each time he translates my small poems into song. Thank you, Gart!
Today's poem was inspired by my breakfast, shown in the photograph above, and the final stanza of this poem is a true one for me. My loving grandma Florence Ethel Conolly Dryer did say these words to my mom, and she keeps them alive so that now and forever...pears will taste like perfume to me. My grandma was a great teacher and a poet who loved theatre, battled depression, and brought so much kindness into our lives. Each time my mom tells me a story or shares something that Grandma used to say, I hold on to the words.
What about you? Whose words rise regularly in your mind, even once every long while? What did you eat for breakfast? Who do you miss? One of the interesting things about life is that one thought leads to another leads to another, and if we follow the crumbs, the trail can sometimes add up to a little verse.
Below you can see the happily scribbled draft of this poem, written in the wee hours of this morning before I drove my husband to school. Notice that even though the final words appear here, the line breaks are different. Often when I move from a handwritten draft to a typed one, this is something that changes. It is so easy to change line breaks on a computer, and I am thankful for that.
Draft for Today's Poem
(Click to Enlarge)
Photo by Amy LV
As I wrote the first two lines of this poem (four lines in the first draft), I felt myself remembering one of my favorite books, Lynn Reiser's CHERRY PIES AND LULLABIES, a list story sharing the ways that traditions change - and also stay much the same - through generations. The rhythm of this book still lives within me, just like my grandma's pear-words.
CHERRY PIES AND LULLABIES by Lynn Reiser
Might you be able to think of a book you've heard or read many times and write a poem or story or essay somehwat inspired by its story or rhythm? The world is strewn with good ideas, like the zillions of snowflakes covering our Western New York world.
Your pear poem is so fun Amy! And I agree-- changing from handwritten to typed draft is always a poem changer. Happy Poetry Friday, and thanks for the smile.
ReplyDeleteLovely memory, Amy, and using your grandmother's words makes it very special!
ReplyDeleteAmy, so true! I hadn’t thought about it, but pears do have a floral, perfumy flavor. On a less poetic note, it made me think of when my niece used to say that grapefruit juice tastes like germs. Tee hee hee!
ReplyDeleteThis is such a sweet and juicy poem, Amy. Next time I bite a ripe pear, I'll think of you!
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely post, Amy! Your poem and words offer such a sweet connection through the generations. I will think of your grandmother when I next bite into a pear--her words are so poetically apt! Just this morning I was writing about my mother's tendency to say she was "tickled pink." Maybe I'll go back and look for a bit of verse there. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteThank you the sweetness this morning, Amy, and for your wise words that already sparked ideas in me.
ReplyDeleteOh that ending! What a wonderful memory.
ReplyDeleteYour poem and the memory of your grandma are delightful, Amy, and Gart's song brings it to life so beautifully! (I felt suddenly transported back to listening to Raffi songs with my girls when they were little. Such a cozy memory!)
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