Two years ago, when my grandniece Claire opened her joke journal and began to write, her intention turned into a poem called “Bog the Dog”: Once there was a dog named Bog / She loved the fog / One day she sat on a log / And drank eggnog / and saw a frog.
The rest is history. Or, rather, poetry.
On Easter Sunday, my wife, Tia, and I lunched with friends and relations, including my niece Lizzie and her two children, Claire, now 9, and Janie, 7.
After an egg toss, silly string battle and blown bubbles bursting wobbly, glassy, pingpong-ball prisms, Claire brought over her poetry journal whose cover suggested “Keep Calm and Carry On Writing.” She plunked herself down in the wicker chair next to mine.
I loved listening to all her poems, but when she read “The River,” I was mesmerized.
I love the river oh sweet river / I lay in the grass all day / I sing a song all day long / as the grass grows and sways….
“My favorite!” I roared, hearing Walt Whitman. “I love its repetition, its flow, like the river.”
“Thank you,” she said, demurely.
Beneath the poem, drawn in blue pen, two simple, wavy lines suggested the titular subject.
“I do my drawings after I write the poem,” she said. “If I did them before, I might forget what I wanted to write.”
When Claire joined a lawn soccer game, Janie wandered over.
“Do you write poetry?” I asked.
“I wrote a story,” Janie said.
Two writers in the same family! How bedazzling!
On the cover of “Cutie’s Cupcake Story” Janie drew Cutie Pie, a pink heart with long brown hair, standing on thin legs beneath a rainbow arch, her hands holding rainbow cupcakes above her head.
In the Hidden Forest, Cutie Pie makes rainbow cupcakes from rainbows, the story goes. One day the sun comes out and she can’t make cupcakes. Because that’s all she eats, she feels disappointed and is starving. Then she goes to the end of the world where she finds gold to make her cupcakes. She jumps for joy and hugs her friends.
Asked how she came up with the idea, Janie said, “I remembered things I like to do.”
She followed in the most natural way, intuition, the creative writing teacher’s first dictum, “Write what you know.”
Two days later came Lizzie’s announcement, “Our little poet is famous! Claire wrote a poem at dinner and gave it to our waiter, Jess. The Yard House staff were amazing!” They taped her poem, “a good place called Yard House,” by the front door.
A good place called Yard House has really great food, / So scrumptious and yummy, also very good ...
Beneath the poem, Claire wrote, “YARD HOUSE ROCKS!” and drew a slice of pizza, a bouquet of tenders and a fizzy cup of soda.
Oh, how one adult’s small gesture of goodwill can enhance a blossoming poet’s – or storyteller’s – confidence and pride.
“When you’re writing,” I asked Claire, “how do you feel?”
“Really happy and calm.”
I thought, “Is there anything better?” then asked, “Do you read poetry?”
“Shel Silverstein. And I’ve kept the poems you sent me. You’re one of my favorite poets.”
The interview couldn’t get better.
“I’m still going to send you a daffodil poem,” she said.
Saying goodbye after Easter lunch, Claire wanted ideas for a poem. I spied bunches of heaven-scented, yellow-cupped jonquils. Perfect.
Spending time with these two burgeoning writers, I feel like William Wordsworth in the last lines of the flower’s most famous poem: And then my heart with pleasure fills, / And dances with the daffodils.
Well, the most famous poem – until Claire finishes hers.
Happy Poetry Month, everyone!
• Rick Holinger has taught English and creative writing on several academic levels. His writing appears in Chicago Quarterly Review, Chautauqua, The Southern Review and elsewhere. His books of poetry, “North of Crivitz,” and essays, “Kangaroo Rabbits and Galvanized Fences,” are available at local bookstores, Amazon or richardholinger.net. Contact him at editorial@kcchronicle.com.