Mouse's Corner: Poetry in Childhood, A Guest Post by Poet Laura Foley

If you have ever read a young children's book, you may be familiar with the lyrical style many are written in. There is often a playful cadence and quite a bit of rhyming.  And when you think about it, songs are like this as well. Both help with language development in a very fun way. Mouse loves to read and sing (if you ever come for a visit, you might think you live in a musical the way she and I sing about every day life). Poetry is all around us in one form or another. It is something I hope to explore further with my daughter as she grows older. 

I am interested in others' experiences with poetry in their childhood as well, and so I asked Laura Foley, author of Joy Street, to share some of her childhood experiences with poetry. Please welcome Laura to Musings of a Bookish Kitty:

The first poem I remember loving was Dylan Thomas’ Fern Hill. I savored the pastoral images from Thomas’ childhood in Wales (When I was young and easy, under the apple boughs), and the haunting ending, the evocation of old age and death (…though I sang in my chains like the sea). This was in fifth or sixth grade, in New York City. I remember our teacher, Mrs. Taliaferro, explaining how an image can mean more than the literal. This fairly brief poem was Thomas’ autobiography, from childhood to old age, a tale told in images.

I was also drawn to T.S. Eliot’s New Hampshire. In this one, I began to understand how big concepts could be expressed in small details. The lines Golden head, crimson head/Between the green tip and the root./Black wing, brown wing, hover over… stay with me to this day. It was a poem of children playing beneath an apple tree, but it was more than a simple story. Lilting and elegant, it suggested a world of ideas and sensations just beyond grasp.

Later, when I had my first child (by then I was living in New Hampshire!), I would recite from memory T. S. Eliot’s Prufrock (Let us go now, you and I, when the evening is spread out against the sky…). I loved the lyrical sounds of the words, the lilting cadence that felt comforting to me and, I hope, to my baby in the crib.

Thank you, Laura! Be sure and visit tomorrow to read my review of Joy Street.

To learn more about Laura Foley, and her book, please visit the author's website.

I hope you will check out what others had to say about Joy Street on the TLC Book Tours route!

Many thanks to the TLC Book Tours for the opportunity to be a part of this book tour. 

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