Welcome to “Things Worth Remembering,” in which writers share a poem or a paragraph that all of us should commit to heart. Today, in honor of Father’s Day, The Free Press’s very own Peter Savodnik shares his favorite poem to read to his daughter.
When I was 6, my father gave me Shel Silverstein’s poetry collection Where the Sidewalk Ends, and in the evenings, after I bathed and before I went to bed, we read poems on the sectional in our family room. When I think about these moments, I remember the smells: the books on the bookshelves, the residue of the aftershave my father had slapped on that morning, the hint of the Scotch he had had after dinner. And the sounds: my mother washing dishes in the kitchen or putting my sister to bed; a Chopin nocturne or Mozart concerto on the hi-fi.
So when my daughter, Josephine, was 6, I gave her the same collection. Published in 1974, it’s shot through with references to televisions and tree houses and jump ropes and kids who have chores, and it felt, by the second decade of this century, a tad dated. No matter. Like my father, I made a point of reading poems with her on our couch after her nightly bath and before she went to bed. Like me, she loves every last poem in there.
