‘Nineteen at Nine’: This 9-yr-old poet finds magic in the mundane

This small wonder is following the footsteps of great poets like Edward Lear and Roald Dahl. Aaliyah Jain, a student of Delhi’s GD Goenka School, has published her collection of nineteen poems at the tender age of nine – Nineteen @ Nine.

Aaliyah discovered her love for poetry at the age of seven when she first got an assignment, two years back, in her creative writing class. Her parents encouraged her to pen down her thoughts.

One day, her parents realised that she already had a collection of poems when they decided to publish her book of poems. 

“I write these poems every day, so it took me 5 months. Out of all my poems, most of them are about nature. One is about trees, one about squirrels, one is a rainbow that came in my dream. I have written mostly about nature because I love nature. My favourite among all these poems is My window, My world,” said Aaliyah, talking about her collection of poems.

“A new day is about Corona and how everyone strived in Corona but I’ve not written in a negative way but in a positive way, that it will go away and our lives will become normal soon,” the little poet added.

Writer Marty Rubin once said, “The child’s naive dream of life is the only one worth having.”

Shedding light on Aaliyah’s thought-provoking ideas, her father said, “These are typical thoughts and the book is about children’s curiosity. Sometimes we need to talk to a child to understand life again and find magic even in the mundane.”

Aaliyah’s father, a CA by profession, has also authored a novel Chasing 33, a story about two sixteen-year-old boys all set to take on their board exams.

Set in the lush greenery of the 1990’s Assam, Jitendra Jain’s book takes one on a walk down the nostalgic lane and is replete with references to the teenage years of any kid.

It has tongue-in-cheek humour and laugh-out-loud moments, described as ‘Clever, sharp, witty’ by poet, journalist, former parliamentarian and film-maker Pritish Nandy.

Nandy also wrote the Foreword for Aaliyah’s book of poems Nineteen @ Nine. “At nine, one sees the real world-not through a glass, darkly. That is why when young Aaliyah captures magical moments in her poetry you are impressed by the authenticity of her world, her questions, her curiosity,” wrote the poet.

“This thin sheaf of her poems was like catching the last train back to innocence,” opined Nandy.

Buy a copy of Aaliyah Jain’s Nineteen @ Nine here.

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