Essential Poems for Children

Essential Poems for Children: First Aid for Frantic Parents, by Daisy Goodwin, is one of her many small anthologies themed on various life situations. This one, obviously enough, is for poems parents (and other interested adults!) may wish to read to children.

I think we forget how naturally poetry comes to children; for a lot of people, poetry is something done at school and hated, forced to dissect and analyse the construction, the similes, the metaphors, the point of placing this word here rather than there, so much that we forget that one of poetry’s main goals in life is to pulse with a reflection of life. Children, used to nursery rhymes and the repetition of stories, understand that, and will often eat up poetry without even show more realising they’re doing it.

I’m a firm believer in the ability of a good poem to convey something meaningful in a powerful way, and I think we should all be able to find ways to fit poetry into our lives. It’s not the dry and dusty thing that school makes people think it is, but something that forges connections across differences. One of the simplest things in the world that makes me happy is seeing poetry displayed prominently on the Subway in Glasgow, or the Underground in London, becoming part of people’s normal environment.

Anyway, I bought this because my god-daughter, at the tender age of three and a half, has started to write and is desperate to show off the few words she can manage to commit to paper (most with the help of Mum at this stage), so has been sending me small messages along with other stuff (notably the bottle of 30 year old single malt from a private distillery she was good enough to send me for my birthday last month!). In reply I have been finding fun cards and writing short replies back, and with each card goes a poem, something she can read with her Mum and Dad as a small present from me. The challenge of being a good godfather when I’m living in the English Midlands, and she lives on the Western Isles (off Scotland’s north-west coast for those of you not familiar with UK geography) is one I intend to rise to, and this helps; poems are something simple I can give her that reflect both me, and hopefully are fun for her.

Goodwin’s anthology is decent enough though, as with all collections of its sort, I think it misses some obvious classics (though that may be the reason for missing them out) in favour of some that I don’t think flow as well. Still, it’s full of good poems to read with and to children of all ages, and in that it serves its purpose. show less