Reading Lessons

by

I've done this for ten years, put my sons' fingers to page, drawn language from tongues But Daniel confounds, scatters into sounds my gather of ordered words. The curve of diphthongs gets lost between his eyes and mouth. He would rather climb trees, build models, do algebra, or clean his room. I hide lessons in Harry Potter's cloaks, Shel Silverstein's lighted attic, on Mark Twain's riverboats, show him words in hymnals and sing them in his ear. and directions for paper airplanes. But he is not fooled, poises over each offering like he's eating spinach, takes tiny bites, makes faces, and spits them out, reducing me to and and, as my mother did me,