Ella: The Skald, The Poem 

** I feel like this needs some editing, so anyone feel free, but be kind of nice...

The background:

While still in undergraduate school I once described the Vikings as "precious."

It was a very Monica, "oh Professor Darien, those Vikings were just pillaging and plundering their little hearts out! Just precious!" I was met with one of her famous, among Hartwick English Lit students, headshakes coupled with a long sip of diet coke. I feel compelled to tell you that I do understand the Vikings were a rather rough tribal culture and in the future will try to reserve that particular adjective to things like babies, puppies, and puppies dressed up like babies, etc. Actually though, the widely popular views of the Vikings as violent, brutish red-heads are disputed in the scholarly community. It is said that those big old Germanic savages really acquired that rep beginning in the eighteenth century during the Viking Revival...

This is not an essay on Vikings. I do have a point. The point being, I woke u p thinking of the Viking skalds, a Nordic poet, and the told tale. So now I am writing it down!! I would love to learn more about the skalds, and I fancy the romantic image in my head of myself, sitting on a large rock on Scottish icy shores, wrapped in furs, maybe even chewing on a meat leg (they did that, right?) A group of children gathered a my knee, waiting for their story.

This image redefines itself in my modern life. Most often, I am my daughter's skald. And she mine. Our modern poems are made up of "Mama, tell me stories of when I was a baby!" Her blonde head resting on my shoulder as I launch into whatever funny memory of the many trials of Miss Ella Mary Pawkett. 

I have always known my daughter was made up of poetry. Every second she walks the earth is one more thread, one more line, in the vibrantly colored tapestry that is her poem. Her poem dances and sings. Some of the thread shimmers from her star and the moon. Some of the thread is damp from tears.  Threads are dyed blue,green and grey from trips to the ocean. Gold and red threads colored by every Christmas ornament she has hung on her trees. Pink threads from party dresses. And,the multicolored threads are our stories.

I knew Ella was a poem the second I laid eyes on her. Maybe it was her star that clued me in. When she was a tiny baby, the poems sparkled in the air outside her laugh. When she learned to walk, every bumped behind frustration became another line. Only I could hear my fellow skald of course, although I often suspect my mother, as she shares our powers, may heave heard too. 

The first time she actually spoke a poem, her first story, was much later. She was around age four or five, and after bedtime tales of Belle and Ariel, she looked up from her snuggly bed, and I saw the story, there behind her big blue eyes! I have never asked her if she got the warm feeling that I always got when one comes to me. I should ask her and will.

"Mama, what's a nightmare?" Well Woog, a nightmare is when a black hooded figure creeps out of a box and puts unhappy or scary thoughts inside our dreams. Usually, our dreams are protected by the day mares, beautiful sparkling gold creatures that carry shields painted with pieces of our good dreams. Everybody knows that...

"Well mama, I had a nightmare last night, do you wanna know it?" 

"Absolutely Woogen! Do tell!"

                                       Woogies First Told Tale

She had had a dream that voices were yelling at her, and she thought that something scary would steal her in the night. When she came looking for us, we weren't in our room. She was all alone. "Mama, that was the really scary part." she proceeded downstairs to the kitchen. She climbed up on a chair and helped herself to some Oreo cookies. As she munched, she wandered out onto the front porch. "Oooh Mama, remember the window I fell out of when I was three?!" " But of course, how could I forget my love?" 

Well, she climbed out that window and proceeded to walk down the driveway. She was headed 'round the corner to her BFF Gabrielle's when she was met by a large, shaggy dog. The dog told her to go back inside. She was afraid of the dog, so she did just what he said! Then she stepped on a turtle. Then she woke up. 

"Excellent story Woogie! Did all that really happen in one dream slash nightmare?"

"Oh yes it did Mama, it was a looonnng dream!"

But I saw the story, the poem, dance behind her smile as she drifted off. 

Versions of that first story have been amended over the years. One even came up just the other day, while we were on the cape. Still, even in the heart of these preteen years I still get those requests for stories of when she was little. And her eleven year old blonde head still snuggles up to me. This time, she told the story and this time, she was awake. Apparently she found Daddy sleeping on the couch and she was mad. So, she decided to walk to Gabbys. But, by the time she reached the end of the driveway, she was tired and turned back. I asked her if she saw the dog, and her somewhat withering reply was "no, not in years." 

But, that night, as I kissed her before bed and reminded her to turn off the damn iPad, I saw the story dance again. 

I bequeath to my beautiful baby all of my stories. I want her to tell stories to her children. Ella is a poem. I only wrote part of her,but I am in there all over the place. My threads change colors. They are the thickest and the strongest. The protective threads. My daughter is a poem, and each day grows a new verse. My daughter has skald blood in her veins. She will pass our stories through generations. And when I leave this earth, I will watch her from my star and send her inspiration. My baby the poem, my baby the skald...