I recently discovered a book that has been passed down to me from my mother. The name of the book is "A Thousand and One Gems of English Poetry," whose original owner signed a blank page. Her name was Nancy K. Pingree who I believe was my great great (great?) aunt. Seeing the unusual spellings plus the overwhelming emotions that many or the poems contain was beyond interesting. Although the language was at time difficult to get through because of the way punctuation and spelling were so alien to me, I still found the book intriguing.

I was an avid reader at a very young age. My grandfather inherited some books from an elderly lady, and Gems of Poetry was handed to me with an autograph in it to the original owner who was associated with President Lincoln. I do not remember who he was because I had the book for a very short time before my brother destroyed it. (He stole it from my room, my parents didn't believe in locks accept for their doors.) I lived in a very hostile environment and I dived into that book with gusto!! For some reason parts of Sleep Baby Sleep were missing from my book, and after reading the poem FINALLY after 25 years on this website I can see it must have broken someones heart to read those words. I wish I could remember more but all I do remember is I cherished this book! And it has been a 25 year long search to find it again. Thank you internet!! I know this isn't much of a review, but I'm reading all of the poems over again and I will post what captured me! I encourage all of you to read this book!