Wide-eyed Wondering- Jeannie Kirby

I Wonder, You Wonder, No Wonder!

'I Wonder' by Jeannie Kirby


This is a classic poem almost fit to be a nursery rhyme.


Except for the sixth couplet which hardly rhymes, all the earlier five did.


So, what is this poem all about? What is that sublimal message that Jeannie wanted to convey?


Was it justified ignorance or plain innocence that is central to Jeannie's thoughts when she wrote this poem? 


The poem touches on the elements of nature. The grass, the wind, trees, the moon,the stars, lightning, the rainbow and clouds. Even the birds and their nests were not spared.


The little boy or little girl is the persona.


In first person, that child asked these valid questions that even adults may be stumped for an answer.


How does one explain to the child about colours and the science of it being so be it in magenta to violet?


Again, we feel the wind but why does it sometimes blow to stir the air around us so violently until gale-force in some instances?

Who taught the birds to built a nest?

The question about the birds building nests without being taught is a very deep question for a child. How does one convincingly explain that it is just as  instinctive just like birds flying to warm southern skies to escape the bitter winters in the cold north? Or just as bears catch  catch salmon trouts that are programmed genetically to swimm  upstream to spawn eggs? No clear answer except to accept as fiat or faith.


Do trees really take a rest? Possibly because the imaginative child could envision that trees could move and just like humans need to take a rest now and then. Perhaps they do walk once in a long-long while like Treebeard in the 'Lord of the Rings' when calamity come their way. If JRR Tolkien can imagine that, why can't we believe this questioning child? 


The shape of the moon being round and not so round at times can be explained these days by planetary science. Not so, in earlier days without Google. That is why we have tales about dogs and hounds eating the moon and the sun and those Chinese people banging on their metal pails and cymbals to frighten away those dastardly canines to get back their adoring and romantic moon.


The stars that comes out only at night and disappears when day dawns. Did someone light them like century old street gaslights and snuff out the flame as morning comes. Another valid question that beggars an answer.


Lightning flashes? Did they come from Mount Olympus and from Zeus's thunderbolt? Can you explain the science of positive charges and negative charges to an inquisitive growing up kid? Is the child ready to understand scientific principles?


Looking for a pot of gold? Then look no further; seek your rainbow after the rain has gone. Tell the child about the wonders of science of light and water. Will she understand this too?


Cottony clouds hanging up high in the sky. So, did someone hang them there or do we need to tells the child about water vapours and condensation?


Then, the last couplet is the coup de grace. Touche!


Did my father have all these answers and yet did not tell me? Why, oh why?


Disquieting for any adult, I am sure.


So, Jeannie pray tell. Are you mocking the adult or throwing thoughts through the perception of an innocent child? Is the child a prodigy?


Where is that middle ground that we must seek for to provide an explanation that soothes both adult and child?


I remembered clearly a scene from the movie, "A Passage to India". 


The Professor met the protagonist in a lake-house in Kashmir. He had a a letter with him to give to that person  coming to meet him. Visibly angry when he found out that the letter was kept by the Professor for such a long time, he demanded an answer. "


And the answer..................." You were not ready for it then, you are ready to receive it now".


In that same vein, the child will get her answers by and by and only when she is ready to digest and learn the facts of nature. 


Otherwise, it will remain a mystery and a marvel until she grows up. 


Remember William Blake's 'Songs of Innocence' and 'Songs of Experience'? 


Joyful innocence and sombre experience. Bitter sweet refrain.