Final Poetry Assignment

Childhood Memories

By: Jolene Fernandez/ 804

There's fish on my walls.

Paper fish,

Smiling fish.

They smile

Stretched arch smiles

Like parentheses.

Paper smiles

But mine is real.

I put stickers on my door-

A little girl with pink hair and

A boy with blue.

They smile at me

Two tiny parentheses.

Put the parentheses together and they make

A hug,

Two thin arms reaching to 

Hold me

Hold me up 

In silly giggles

Warmth and strength 

Don’t you ever let me go.

Now, the sun has risen and set

Thousands of times

I can barely keep count

And I come to greet the fishes

And the little girl with pink hair and

The boy with blue

But

My tiny little room is no longer

Me.

I have left and

The fishes are gone,

The smiles have faded,

And the stickers

Have been peeled away.

And all that is left on the door is

A scratch of blue.

           

            “Childhood Memories” is largely inspired by the memories I developed as a kid while growing up in California. My bedroom held a number of those memories, of which the poem focuses in on. What I remember most from my room were the construction paper fish that decorated my walls. My mother had pasted them up, and they always reminded me of her and my father. They were homey and welcoming and somehow made me feel loved, just like my parents. As for the stickers, those had been put up as a part of my doing. The boy and girl mentioned on the stickers are real characters called Little Twin Stars, and were definitely some of my favorite Sanrio characters growing up. The sense of connection and delight I felt toward them was something I hoped to capture while writing this poem, and something I hoped that readers would feel as well.

During this unit I certainly think that I expanded my knowledge of poetry. One of my favorite lessons was the creative writing assignment, in which I felt really challenged us to think beyond our boundaries and see poetry in a new light. From this unit I have also learned to not be afraid of personalizing poetry. Most, if not all of my poems this year have been based off of my personal experiences, and by using this information I was able to see myself more clearly in my writing.