No Poet And I Know It!!!

My mom died when I was young (5) and my father's mother, my grandmother moved in with us. My grandmother had been a teacher in a one room schoolhouse when she was 18 years old and she never lost her passion for teaching. I can remember coming home from school and still spending an hour or two with her as she made sure that we were really strong in the three R's - reading, writing and arithmatic. I can remember one time having to choose between watching a movie or spending time on my times tables cause I had to have them memorized by that evening if I wanted to go shrimping with my dad. Every summer we left Miami the day after school was out to spend our summer out in the country in Thomasville, GA, where my grandmother had a house. It was a wonderful time for us; running around out in the country all day, lots and lots of cousins around, going fishing down at the pond, blackberry picking, going out in the field and busting open a big watermelon and eating the heart out of it. Such great memories!! Every day after lunch my grandmother made us come in and rest for a couple of hours in the heat of the day. My Aunt Willie Mae who had a house next door - across a big country yard filled with pear trees - always had the traveling library come in the summer so we had bookshelves full of books. I would use that time of rest in the afternoon for a couple of hours of reading. One summer my grandmother (the teacher at heart) decided that I should do a book report on each book that I read - before I could get another book. Well.....,I just decided that I was not reading any books, so there! After several days of being totally bored, I gave in and did my book report so I could get another book. To add insult to injury, there was one book report she made me do over twice before she would accept it - a biography I had read of George Washington. On my third try I just sort of cut up with it and "made it my own" as my grandmother would say. She accepted that one and it taught me a big lesson - it is okay to add a little humor and personality into a paper that you write. It is a lesson that has helped me a lot, both in school and now as I have to keep in touch with those who partner with me in ministry. One of my favorite books that my grandmother owned is "The World's Best-Loved Poems" published in 1927. Now, I have never been known as a poet, nor even one who enjoys it that much, but I have loved this book. I wrote out a little note, "This book goes to my wonderful,(?) literate & poetically sensitive grandaughter, Cheryl." (You can see that I had already begun using my sense of humor in writing!). I had her sign it and we kept the note in the book so there would be no question as to who got the book when she died. I was such a thoughtful granddaughter!! Anyway, I have enjoyed these poems through my life, seemingly always drawn to the really corney, hokey ones! I will sometimes get it out and read them to my friends and they never seem to have the same sense of enjoyment that I get out of them.....I guess they are just not as "poetically sensitive" as I am! Here is one of my favorites

DO IT NOW

If with pleasure you are viewing any work a man is doing,

If you like him or you love him, tell him now;

Don't withhold your approbation till the parson makes oration

as he lies with snowy lilies o'er his brow;

For no matter how you shout it, he won't really care about it;

He won't know how many teardrops you have shed;

If you think some praise is due him now's the time to pass it to him,

For he cannot read his tombstone when he's dead!

More than fame and more than money is the comment kind and sunny,

And the hearty, warm approval of a friend,

For it gives to life a savor and it makes you stronger, braver,

And it gives you heart and spirit to the end;

If he earns your praise--bestow it, if you like him, let him know it;

Let the words of true encouragement be said;

Do not wait till life is over and he's underneath the clover,

For he cannot read his tombstone when he's dead!

Berton Braley

May be corny wording, but the truths in it are really important! Here is just one verse of another of my favorites from that same theme. The poem is titled "Give To The Living"

If we offered to the living, as we heap upon the dead,

fragrant flowers of affection, blossoms of sweet recollection,

waiting not till hands are folded on the quiet, pulseless breast,

Then the passion of our pleading would not fall on ears unheeding,

Nor our tears fall, unavailing, on the weary form at rest.

Okay, I can hear your grumblings even now, but I love those old poems that actually rhyme! But they really do address an important truth - we so often don't say those words of encouragement and love to those we are close to, we just assume they already know that we feel that way, or our too insecure in our own selves, fearing rejection if we open our hearts up. But, we need to say them! Make your euologies to the living!