She was doing her homework with the help of the live-in babysitter. I was resetting mouse traps for her mother. We were all in the kitchen but I was no more part of the scene than the Calphalon cookware hanging from the pot rack.

"You're almost finished. You just have to do your reading."

"I'll finish it tomorrow."

"You have to finish it tonight. It's just a poem."

"I don't want to."

"But you have to."

"Okay" she said as she started to read silently.

"You have to read it out loud."

"I can't read poems."

"That's okay; just read it like you would anything else. You don't have to worry about the timing."

"But I can't read poems."

She ended up reading the poem. I forget which poem it was, I wasn't too impressed with it but it was a favorite of the babysitter, or at least that's what she said.

I remember being angry at some unknown someone for making, or at least letting, this little girl think she couldn't read poetry.