Something to think about if you’re visiting with your family for Thanksgiving and there are children about: Most people’s first experience of poems comes in the family setting, in the form of nursery rhymes—the lullabyes, counting games, riddles and rhymed fables that introduce us to the rhythmic, mnemonic, allegorical uses of language in songs sung to us by our mothers and other elders. We’ve begun a new anthology at About Poetry, to help you remember the nursery rhymes that have been handed down through the generations in the English-speaking world. Why not take the time this Thanksgiving to teach a few of the classic rhymes of your childhood to your young ones?
And better yet, help us expand our collection by sharing your first remembered poems: Readers Respond: The First Poem I Ever Knew.
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