Dear Brian Sonia-Wallace 2022

From Jack, Grade 8

Dear Mr. Sonia-Wallace,

I am writing to you about the poem you wrote titled “Heirloom.” I really enjoyed this poem, and I have a few questions about it. Did you decide to title it “Heirloom” because of heirloom tomatoes, or because your dad passed down an heirloom to you in his love and appreciation for gardening tomatoes?

I also wonder if you really did get a box of tomatoes from a random person that inspired this poem, or was this something you thought of? Are you often inspired to write by real events and things that you care about? Where do you get your ideas from? Do you enjoy reading your poetry out loud, and how do you prepare to read in front of an audience? I find your project of bringing green space and food to the city really remarkable, and I hope if this is a real project that it is successful!

Thank you for sharing your poetry, and best of luck with your garden project!

Sincerely,
Jack

Hi Jack,

Thanks for your questions! Heirloom, to me, refers to both the tomato variety and what a family passes down in love and care. Honestly, most of the things we eat and use at this point in history are both—we’ve been domesticating tomatoes and everything else for centuries to be bigger and more delicious to us, in exchange for which we water them etc. Coming clean, my dad left me a love of sustainability, but the green thumb for tomatoes hasn’t stuck. My garden consists of a few houseplants I haven’t managed to kill (yet!). There are, however, a ton of interesting and successful urban farming/gardening projects, and if you Google those terms you should find some good stuff.

The poem is in fact based on a real person handing out free tomato plants and a real theatre where I worked at the time. Not all my poems come from true events, but honestly most are at least sparked by them.

As far as reading to an audience—it’s my favorite thing, though I’m inclined to think of everything as not reading but *performance* (blame the theatre background…). Off the page, I think about the same considerations performing a poem as you might think about playing a piece of music, with the words as a score on top of which the performer can interpret rhythm, intonation, emotion, and even silence. I love the feeling of giving the audience a juicy pause at a crucial moment, feeling them leaning in, writing in their own heads what they think will happen next. Performing is one of the many ways a poem becomes an “us” thing rather than a “you” or “me” thing.

An “us” thing,

Brian

From Jaxson, Grade 6

Dear Brian Sonia-Wallace

What really stood out to me in your poem was when you said “And nobody works as hard as clowns.” That stood out to me because I have never really thought about that before, you know I've always just seen clowns as something to laugh at but when you said that it really made me think about how true that is. I also have a question for you about your poem. How come you decided to make a poem about tomatoes? Was your family really into gardening when you were little? And also you talk about a big stage in your poem was your family really into theater and drama?

I have another question for you. What made you decide you wanted to become a poet? Because I know that everyone has a special ability and were you born with the love to write or have you experienced something that made you want to write? What's it like to be a poet who travels around the country reading to people about experiences that you've had in your life. Because my class and I watched a video about a whole bunch of different poems and we watched a video of one of your poems and out of all the poems we heard I picked yours.

I only have a couple more questions and then I'll stop bugging you. First does a poem have to rhyme or can it be like a book where it doesn’t rhyme? Also is poetry like making music? Because I love to listen to music and I was just wondering if poetry was like music. Third at what age did you decide poetry was for you? And lastly I just really like your poem we read called “Heirloom” I found it very fascinating and just really liked it.

Sincerely,
Jaxson

Dear Jaxson,

Thanks for bugging me :)

Thanks for your thoughts on clowns. Some of my best friends are clowns, and I like it that way. They work their butts off.

Question time! My dad always grew tomatoes, he had a t-shirt that said, “gardening is cheaper than therapy, plus, you get tomatoes.” So that’s that. I grew up in a big city so theatre and arts were all around, and it was a way my family connected and spent time together, something we could then talk about and get in-jokes from. But I definitely took it further than my parents! I wonder what your family uses for that? I find everyone has their own fandoms.

I started writing poems as a kid, really getting into it when I was 10. Two reasons: I sucked at typing so my mom made me type a page a day. Poems could fill up a page a lot faster than stories! Also, one time I found out my mom read my diary, and started putting metaphors on everything like a code so I could record my thoughts in secret.

As for traveling around the country writing poems for people, I have a book about that! It’s called The Poetry of Strangers: What I Learned Traveling America with a Typewriter, and your local library should have a copy! In summary: people are amazing and full of stories, poets are tired and slightly sweaty, and the TSA in airports doesn’t know what to do with typewriters.

Ok, final answers. Poems don’t have to rhyme, but can, in the way that a house can be made out of wood or stone or stucco, but is probably a combination of things. In some of my favorite poems, the rhymes are hidden.

I like the analogy to music a lot! There’s some cool neuroscience research that suggests the same parts of our brain light up when we listen to a poem as when we listen to music (as opposed to, say, reading a novel). This is why I like the idea of teaching poetry appreciation before analysis—imagine if the only time you got to listen to music you had to write an essay dissecting it?

Thanks for your questions. Stay curious.

Brian

From Alex, Grade 9

Dear Mr. Sonia-Wallace,

My name is Alex, and I am writing to you as a 9th grader from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Your poem “Heirloom” caught my attention when I first scrolled onto it because of the title. At first, I wondered if the poem was going to be about an intriguing family heirloom that goes back for generations. But as I listened to the first few lines of your poem my interest was immediately piqued, since it was so unexpected. I especially liked the last line of the first stanza. I felt an immediate connection to the poetry because my mom also has a garden, and I have helped her with it ever since I was a small child.

Your poem is chock full of so many well-thought-out metaphors that at first, I didn’t have a clue as to the meaning of it. But after reading your poem many times over, I think I understand it a bit better. To me, your poem advocates for sustainability to attempt to clean up the earth, which has been dirtied over the past couple of centuries. You write, "Tomorrow is white roof, filtered water, solar / panels, cycle racks, urban garden, green / building, public plaza, artist’s village." In the poem, tomatoes could symbolize the building blocks that build this new, cleaner, world. But in the real world, tomatoes can symbolize each person's effort to make this dream a reality.

My most prominent question after reading your poem is, what is the implication of the word “it” throughout the second stanza of the poem. I’ve had a couple of ideas about what it could be but I don’t know for sure so I won’t put them in this letter.

Some other questions that I have are about your writing process when writing this poem. How did you come up with the idea for this poem? Did you pick up a pen one day and start writing, or was it a long process? And finally, how did you come up with the title for this poem—because to me, it seems like the word heirloom has nothing to do with the poem, but at the same time, it appears to be a fitting title?

As much as I would like to know the answer to the first question above, questions like that are precisely why I like this poem and poems in general because they make you think about the meaning instead of letting the words pass you by. Anyway, thanks for listening, and thank you for writing this wonderful piece of literature.

Sincerely,
Alex

Hi Alex,

Thanks for choosing my poem and writing to me! It’s cool to get responses like old-fashioned letters.

Wise of your mom to enlist your help in the garden. I used to love “helping” outside by making mud pies and finding bugs.

I really appreciate your distinction between grand symbols of sustainable futures and the tiny, incremental things each of us can do toward those futures in our day-to-day lives.

The “it” in the second stanza is totally the theatre. Sorry for the confusion. I’ll clean that up for the next version!

Writing this poem came pretty quick and clean—I had a contest I wanted to enter about heathy environments, and was at Home Depot with the people who ran this theatre, and someone offered us free tomato plants. Mostly I was just living and writing it down!

“Heirloom” is a type of tomato but also something passed between generations, so I liked it as a title. It came after I wrote the poem. I remembered my dad always talking about “heirloom tomatoes” and it feeling so grand and old-fashioned that I liked it as a kid. I imagined, like, pirate treasure. But tomatoes.

I’m glad you like poems in general. I suspect poems like you, too.

Brian

From Sophie, Grade 8

Dear Brian Sonia-Wallace,

My name is Sophie and I go to Washington Middle School. I recently came across your poem “Heirloom” when reading poems in my Humanities class. I appreciated how you correlated the growth of tomatoes with a positive change. Though I’m not an avid gardener, I do enjoy planting from time to time, and I enjoy how you portrayed the feelings of change within your poem.

Something that stood out to me was how you used tomatoes in your poem, as highlighted in the line: “To build a cultural heritage...described as ‘Hell’s parking lot’ tomato by tomato.” This stood out to me because of the way you used tomatoes to signify milestones, in this poem, specifically, to show the progress of the garden. Also, something else I noticed was how you showed the controversy of the garden by sharing other’s opinions about the matter. Additionally, a line that I observed was “...nobody dreams as hard as poets.” When reading this, I wondered if you were referring to yourself. I saw this line as a way to emphasize the previous line: “To try to add some poetry to that phrase,” and to show readers how gardeners are also poets, adding “poetry,” or beauty. I find it interesting how you can glorify the uncomplicated action of growing a vegetable.

As someone who appreciates the beauty of the growth of something as simple as tomatoes, I thoroughly enjoy the message you’ve sent through your words. Thank you for your contributions.

Sincerely,
Sophie

From Angelica, Grade 5

Dear Brian Sonia-Wallace,

My name is Angelica, from PS 150 queens. Your poem, “Heirloom,” truly spoke to me and let me understand the importance of something that can seem like nothing to others. In the beginning of your poem, it says,“Dad always grew tomatoes; They were his pride and joy.” This line caught my attention since it showed that something as small as tomatoes can bring someone the feeling of happiness and pride. I can connect to this in many ways. For example, I keep a dog toy beside my bed, and though a dog toy does not seem like a breathtaking object for me it has a special meaning. This dog toy used to be my dog’s favorite toy before he passed away. This dog toy makes me think of him and reminds me that he will always be there. What may seem like something small and insignificant can actually bring someone memories and happiness, as shown is this poem.

Another point that is stated in this poem, is that everyone works hard to achieve their dreams and goals. In the end of the poem it says,“Because nobody dreams as hard as poets; And nobody works as hard as clowns.” These lines state that many people work hard and dream for what they want no matter what it may seem. This connected to me since others in my family and my friends and I work as hard as we can to achieve our dreams and get what we want to achieve. I noticed many techniques that were used in this poem. For example, I think that this poem uses Enjambment. I think this because the poet keeps going somewhat like a story that catches the reader's attention and makes the reader continue to read throughout the entire poem. I also think that this poem uses mood. This is shown is this line, “They were his pride and joy.” This line uses the technique of mood. I think this because this is stating the feelings of one of the characters making a happy, proud and excited mood when thinking about the tomatoes.

Overall, your poem really touched me in many ways. It had a lot of secret meanings, and I love how they are introduced. Many techniques were used to form these ideas and meanings. This poem is a wonderful and beautiful work of art that I can connect to in many ways. “Because nobody dreams as hard as poets; And nobody works as hard as clowns.”

Sincerely,
Angelica

Hi Angelica,

Thanks for sharing about your dog and I’m happy that you keep their toy to honor their memory. It’s important. In fact, one of my reasons for sharing this poem is that my dad died in March 2021, and reading and sharing this poem felt like a way of remembering and honoring him, even though I wrote the poem a long time ago when he was alive.

Thanks also for your analysis of techniques. Do you write your own poems? I’m happy this one connected with you.

Sincerely,

Brian

From Andrew, Grade 11

Dear Brian Sonia-Wallace,

While going through the Dear Poet project I came across your poem “Heirloom,” which I thoroughly enjoyed reading, analyzing, and understanding. The ideas of the past generations and the new living entangled with each other are intriguing. This contrast is one I can see between my generation and that of my parents and grandparents.

When you say, “Today is tomatoes in the parking lot / Tomorrow is white roof, filtered water, solar / panels, cycle racks, urban garden, green / building, public plaza, artist’s village / To build a cultural heritage for the city,” I instantly recognize the transition of one generation passing the baton to the next. My grandpa used to love gardening; he had an apple orchard on top of the traditional backyard garden with vegetables, seasonings, flowers, etc. I’ve never been all that into gardening myself, but whenever I’d visit my grandpa I always loved helping him in the garden. Instead, my generation gravitates towards screens, not so much nature.

The title “Heirloom” is rather clever and I enjoy it. The double meaning for that of an heirloom tomato and an heirloom that is passed down through generations fits well. The two meanings together bring the poem together from either generational perspective.

You use gardening and tomatoes as a metaphor for an older generation and film and theater for the newer and younger generation. When the two are added together, they don’t mix well. In theater and film, tomatoes are used as projectiles, thrown at performers. How did you come up with this metaphor?

The last two lines of the poem, “Because nobody dreams as hard as poets / And nobody works as hard as clowns,” add a personal note I enjoy. What gave you the idea of using these two lines to end the poem?

The experience I had reading this poem was much more than a simple read. Your 25 lines of poetry spoke to me like no other poem and truly inspires me. Thank you for taking the time to read my letter.

Sincerely,
Andrew

Dear Andrew,

I like the idea of tomatoes as projectiles in the theatre! I hadn’t thought of that association. It’s ironic, isn’t it? But isn’t that what we do as writers and artists all the time, grow the tomatoes that people can either eat and enjoy or throw at us in disgust. All we can do is grow the tomatoes—it’s up to the audience how they want to use them.

The tomatoes were a real thing. I find the best metaphors are often real things. Same with clowns and poets, it was a clown theatre and I was just starting to take my poetry seriously and think about myself as a poet when I wrote this piece. I find people often have this idea of artists as living with their heads in the clouds, and while that has to be true some of the time, the most successful artists I know are also shrewd small business owners (they are their own business!) and fierce activists and advocates for their communities.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, and I’m glad the poem connected.

Brian

Dear Brian Sonia-Wallace 2022

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Brian Sonia-Wallace reads "Heirloom"

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