The heart is a garden
Where thought flowers grow
Every thought that we think
Is a seed that we sow
Every kind, loving thought
Bears a kind loving deed
While thoughts that are selfish are just like a weed
So be careful what you think
In every minute of the day
Pull out the weed thoughts and throw them away
And plant loving seed thoughts
So thick in a row
That there’ll be no more room for those weed thoughts to grow
Lucinda (Post) Martin is on a mission to find a former teacher who has influenced her life. Every time she walks into her sunroom decorated with flowers, she remembers a poem which now hangs within its confines.
The poem is titled “The Heart is a Garden,” a piece that fits well in Martin’s flowered sunroom.
Martin remembered the poem, but not verbatim, she said. In the 1970s, she was in sixth grade at Jefferson School when she had to remember the poem — an assignment given by Stan Kaufman, her teacher and a former priest in Morton.
“That one has always been in my head,” Martin said.
To her, the poem is inspirational — it has impacted the way she thinks, she said. So, she looked for it at Morton Public Library. And, with the help of the staff there, the poem was located.
The only problem is, Martin has been unable to locate the teacher who made her remember it for class.
It was Kaufman’s teaching style. Through poems, Martin said Kaufman was able to instill values and morals in a young child’s life.
“That was his way of getting to us,” Martin said. “They were symbolic. It was all about morals.
“It was a good way for him to put that into a child’s life, even if they didn’t have that in their background.”
As a young girl, Martin was unable to appreciate the value of the poem.
“Back then, I never even thought of it,” she said. “The older I get, I think, ‘Boy, what an impact he made.’”
Martin is hoping to get in contact with Kaufman, but she is not sure where he lives or if he is even alive.
Martin asked that anyone who may be familiar with Kaufman contact her through e-mail, lumar10@comcast.net.
She is also seeking poems that her classmates had to remember.
“If anybody had all of them, I want them,” she laughed.
If she is successful in finding Kaufman, she said she wants to write him a letter.
“If anybody else knows where he is at, I want to tell him he has influenced my life,” she said.
