Homegrown Poetry

It has always been my suspicion that mom and dad had only one thing in common. Poetry. Mom owned one special book from her youth. She showed it to me all torn and tattered, loosing its binding. She had a mirth in her voice as she explained to me that this was her twelveth grade English text book. In 1928-1929 LeMoyne-Owen College was also a high school. When she graduated she immediately was hired teaching in the primary grades. She was eighteen years old. Mom returned to college when I was in my primary grades.
The title of this book is One hundred and one Famous Poems published by R. S. Cook, the Cable Company 1926. The pages are yellow and patched with scotch tape. There are notes scribbled from her studies. And in addition there were names of her classmates written next to the poet's pictures. A joke, she said as she laughed her memories.
Occasionally on Saturday nights I would hear dad reading aloud from his bedroom. He was reading from this book. Stumbling then repeating to practice a line. He read poems as performance at his church.
The best thing I liked about this collection of classic poems is that there was a first line index in the back. Mom had the book rebound as a gift to me in 1991.
The total memory of a poem comes in two parts------
A clear recitation of the first few words:

O Captain. My Captain, our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won.

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree . . .

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both and be one traveler . . .

More first few words:

One road leads to London,
One road leads to Wales,
My road leads me seawards
To the white dipping sails.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary . . .

The smell of the sea in my nostrils,
The sound of the sea in mine ears;
The touch of the spray on my burning face,
Like the mist of reluctant tears.


The owl and Pussy-cat went to sea in a beautiful Pea green boat
They took some honey, and plenty of money
Wrapped up in a five-pound note.

The second part of the memory of a poem is a recollection of a feeling. The words are right on the tip of your tongue. You know what the poem was about, but all you have is the feeling that your mind traveled. You long to go there again.

Through the years I have traveled to and fro with these poems. Others I have added when first I heard the expression "spinning a yarn," from a yachtsman. This sailboat captain had so, so many tales to tell of his pleasure boat sailing career. In order to compete I searched for nautical poems to recite onboard. It was a solution that has continued to our recent cruise out of Rockland, Maine. We anchored in cozy coves and windless ports on up the coast to Belfast, Maine last summer. After dinner we read to each other and laughed.