Thursday, January 17, 2013

A CHILD AND THE ORIGIN OF THE POET


What is poetry? How does it work?

"One morning, I cut my fingernails and left the parings on the centre table in the sitting room and went into my bedroom briefly to return my manicure set to its usual place. She had been in her room while I cut the nails and had obviously come into the sitting room while I was in my room. As I returned to the sitting room she approached me, exultant, with one of the parings between her right thumb and forefinger, holding up the cut fingernail, and declared: “Daddy, this is the moon!”
“That is not the moon!” I interjected. “It is my fingernail paring.”
“No! It is the moon.” She insisted, raising the paring toward my face as if to show me the shape of the moon in case I did not know."

Ikeogu Oke provides some helpful insights.

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