Ode to my Son’s Son

One small child with hair like corn silk and

eyes as blue as the sky holds the strings to my heart.

His smile lights up the day as bright as the sun.

The love that shines in his eyes when he gives a big hug and a wet kiss is worth more than all the gold in a king's realm.

He tugs on those strings and I go to be with him at once. He laughs, I laugh; he cries, I cry; he hurts and I hurt.

I kiss it and make it well...he's my son's son and he holds the strings to my heart in his hands.

Grandma 1995

This little poem has a story behind it.  At the time it was written, I was a fairly new grandma and was totally captivated by my grandson.  I was sent to Atlanta, Georgia, the headquarters for BellSouth by whom I was employed at the time, for a course in Effective Communication Skills which included some training in simplicity, or tailoring our business correspondence using no more than the average sixth-grade vocabulary words, since that is what most of us use in our daily conversation anyway, unless there are special, technical terms  involved.

Anyway, our instructor gave the class an assignment to write something---anything we wanted, except we could only use words with one syllable each.  It didn't matter what format we used so long as we limited the words to one syllable to prove the point that simplicity could work in creating effective communications.  The catch was, we only had ten minutes.

I sat thinking for probably at least five of the minutes, then I started to write and the poem above was my contribution to the assignment.  When the teacher returned to the room, we had to read what we had written out loud to everyone.  Some were really pretty good, but some were like the old "Dick & Jane" books from the fifties..."I have a dog.  His name is spot...." type sentences were the prevailing style.  When I read my little poem, everyone just looked at me sort of funny.  One little guy thought I needed to put it on a crossstitch pillow, others wanted me to submit it for publication.  I haven't ever done anything with it other than post it once in a while on various places or share it with a few people, but it has remained special to me.  I couldn't even name it "Ode to Timothy" to turn it in because Timothy had too many syllables.  Hence, the original name was, "Ode to my son's son."

This "little guy" is now a sophomore in college, 19 years old and is still holding onto my heartstrings along with four more grandsons and one granddaughter.  Being a grandma is a most special blessing from God.  My husband says "Grandchildren are God's gift to us for  not killing our own children," but he's just joking around.  He loves all six of them with every fiber of his being and so do I.  I don't think there is any relationship that is more special among God's children other than our relationship with Him.

Thank you for taking the time to read my little story and my favorite poem.