The table was set with our favorite teapot and mismatched teacups with saucers picked up in our latest thrifting adventure. Poetry books were scattered around the table, waiting to be opened and a favorite poem read. I called my children to the table for our first "Poetry Tea" and they ran through the house as though it were the best day of the year. After pouring tea in everyone's cup, and passing around store-bought cookies I grabbed the night before, I invited them to pick up a book and choose a poem to read out loud. To break the ice, I went first, reading a poem they had learned to recite a year ago—one we all knew and loved:
There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing Poetry –
This Traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of Toll –
How frugal is the Chariot
That bears the Human Soul –
~Emily Dickinson
Once I had gone first, they were eager to read the poems they had selected, and we spent an hour and a half reading poetry to each other on that rainy afternoon. We read poems from Emily Dickinson, Robert Louis Stevenson, Sara Teasdale, and Maya Angelou. C. S. Lewis, Shel Silverstein, Christina Rossetti, and Langston Hughes. We read poems that made us laugh, we read poems that made us sad, poems we didn’t understand, and ones that made us mad.
I hadn't read poetry in years. My high school English teacher's question of But what does it mean? still rings loud in my ears, but this time with my children has made me start to see that poetry is not about meaning; poetry is about emotion. Prioritizing poetry for my children has become my own gateway to loving poetry. The more poetry I read to them, the more I want to read poetry for myself.
A few weeks ago, I started a poetry journal and am learning to write my own poetry. There's something so freeing about being able to write all my emotions without worrying about whether or not it's appropriate. As I dig deeper into writing the hard stuff in my head, I’m finding poetry to be a refreshing change of pace. When I stopped trying to understand what the poet meant and stepped back to look at how the poetry made me feel, I realized that poetry is like a great piece of art. It holds the meaning of the artist, yes; but it also holds so much more. It holds the feelings and emotions of anyone—everyone—who reads it, and it just may have a different meaning every single time.
Poetry is the heartbeat of humanity, I'd like to think.
P.S. April is National Poetry Month, and to celebrate I am participating in 30 Days of Haiku. You can find my poems over on Instagram if you’re into that kind of thing.