I Wish

By Ingrid Godon and Toon Tellegen

  • is an illustrator from Belgium.

  • is a Dutch writer and poet.

  • 2011

  • 9+

Thirty-three amazing poems, thirty-three breathtaking portraits. This book is a collection of random thoughts, that sometimes taken out of context don’t make much sense. Sometimes, they are so close to home that you shiver.

Transparent paper is a perfect tool. Occasional poems start with the words I wish but if you flip the page over the effect is amazing. The poem sounds like it’s someone’s real experience.

I wish

there were pictures everywhere of two arms sticking up in the air

with a red diagonal stripe through them…

Why is it written this way? Is it because sometimes our thoughts feel too real to be dreams? Do we imagine things and then forget it’s not reality?

We talked with the kids about Ingrid Godon’s art and what inspired it. They were particularly impressed by Norbert Ghisoland’s portraits. How do they make you feel? Do you think when a photo is black and white and lacks details we focus more on the feelings of the model? What do their faces say to you?

Can you see how Flemish Primitives influenced Ingrid Godon’s artwork?

Every story is different. Every wish is unique only so much. One of the first poems in the books is about a boy thinking of death. I decided to skip this page not to evoke any unwanted emotions. But before we started I told the kids that some of the pages might sound really odd to them and that’s because our thoughts can be random and even sound silly to another person. That’s why we don’t share all our thoughts and keep them to ourselves. Do you have thoughts that might even reoccur but you are sure they are not always clear and making much sense? And one of the girls told us that she often thinks of death because she is scared of it. And then another child said she feels the same, only she is scared for a different reason. One wants to live because she loves life, another girl doesn’t want to be forgotten. Here are a few lines from the book:

This is my last request.

When I die, I want them to check

how long someone’s still thinking of me.

The’ll be a machine they can use.

There isn’t one yet. But when I die there will be.

Mark my words.

A memoriammaphone.

And we did read those lines. I felt I couldn’t dismiss them. Our thought aren’t unique. There are a lot of people thinking the same as you. They just never share. Thanks to Ingrid and Toon they did.

I love how they are written. It’s very truthful. Our thoughts are like butterflies flapping their fragile wings and moving quickly from one flower to another. It’s written as if it weren’t written but thought. With all those unfinished sentences and dramatic pauses. We mumble when we talk sometimes but when we think our thoughts are nearly always jumbled.

Most of the poems go together with a portrait. We can look in those faces and imagine the kids talking about themselves. And we know their names. But not all of them. There’s a poem abut love. The boy really wants the girl to like him and write his name on the wall. I wish… And again we can turn the page over and his wishes become reality.

I wish

I was walking past a wall one day.

It would be spring and the sun would be shining

and suddenly I would see my name.

That’s me!

Under my name it says that dot-dot-dot loves me

and will never love anyone else. Oh, dear, dear, dear…

(and then my name again)

There’s a heart with an arrow through it too, with her name

at the bottom on the left and mine on the right at the top.

Dot-dot-dot is a girl at school, who if you ask me has never

once so much as looked in my direction.

I wish I’d walk past a wall like that one day.

And this poem is missing a name and a portrait. The kids concluded that’s because he is too shy to come out. He won’t even share her name. It’s a secret. Thank you for sharing though.

Loved it!