Perspectives

A letter/story style poem about a child teaching the father:

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My nine-year-old son walked up to me the other day and asked “Daddy, why is the sky blue?” I looked up and said “The sky may be blue, for thus I perceive it too. Like the color of the sun in its shade of yellow. See there behind that cloud little fellow? The green of the grass and the brown of the trees: Not unlike that grasshopper there by your knees. But as for why these things are so; I can’t honestly say that I really know.”

My son gently leaned over and plucked the greenery upon which a ladybug perched, rose to his feet and my soul his wondering gaze began to search. As I went back to raking the leaves my son bent down to his ripped jean clad knees. Watching him poking at a red fallen leaf of Autumn, I wondered what indeed I had actually taught him. While children expect their fathers to know it all, I still felt that professing my ignorance was the right call.

Gently blowing on the red and black flier, he innocently watched as the gentle insect whirred away higher and higher. Then standing and scratching his head he smiled, pointed at a tree and said, "I suppose it doesn’t really matter about the why of these things so long as we can appreciate the beauty of that robin as he sings."

Thus said, my son walked into the house leaving me to think about his words. Perhaps in the end all that matters in this world is in the warbling melodies of the birds. Despite all our daily cares and woe: All the wonderful and terrible things we know: We can sometimes be met with a wonder approaching awe when we try to figure out what it was a nine-year-old saw.