¡PÍO PEEP!
La palabra se hace canto y juego para los niños. For children, words create a world of song and play.—Alma Flor Ada
I may be ‘una Americana-Americana’ {the American-born daughter of American-born parents}, but that’s not quite the same as plain American. Spanish was my first language; my first word—luna—was spoken as I pointed to the shining moon. By the time I was three, having surpassed my father’s Spanish vocabulary and started attending daycare, English became my primary and soon was virtually my only language.
‘Si entiendo, pero no hablo mucho espańol,’ is a frequent explanation to those who take my pronunciation as a sign that I speak lots of Spanish. {Papi must also be forgiven some grandfatherly extravagance concerning my abilities.}
Still, woven deep in my psyche are my most treasured experiences in the Spanish language—fragments of song and rhyme and chant: speed-singing ‘La cucuracha’ with my siblings, my aunt crooning ‘Los pollitos dicen,’ my grandfather chanting ‘Sana, sana, colita de rana...’ while rubbing a scraped knee, and the euphonious anthem ‘De colores’ {which my grandmother loved to sing, I am told}. There is also the birthday declaration ‘Sapo verde es tú’ {sung to ‘Happy birthday to you,’ and translated ‘You are a green toad’}; and there is the special greeting and farewell for our grandfather: ‘Te quiero mucho, hasta tamaño del cielo que no tiene fin.’
my grandparents, before they left Cuba for the United States
Such playful use of words and sounds is the beginning to a full experience of any language; it is, in fact, every child’s experience of her own language. Whether you are learning or teaching Spanish, its nursery songs and rhymes should be a part of what you are doing—not because they are ‘easy,’ but because they embody a primal connection to the language’s internal music.
When I started looking for a simple and beautiful introduction to Spanish nursery rhymes, I found a gem in Alma Flor Ada’s collection ¡Pío Peep! She and F. Isabel Campoy have collected a few of the best known and best loved rhymes of Spanish oral folklore, on both sides of the ocean; each is lavishly illustrated by Viví Escrivá’s colorful depictions of children, mothers and animals.
For each Spanish rhyme Alice Schertle has written an English version which is not a literal translation but a ‘poetic recreation’ that preserves ‘the charm of the the original rhymes.’
I’ve been working my way through my copy of the book, and learning the rhymes. This month, I have been reciting this every day in sing-song:
A la rueda, rueda
De pan y canela.
Dame un besito
y vete a la excuela.
Y si no quieres ir,
¡Acuéstate a dormir!
Alice Schertle’s version reads:
Bread and cinnamon,
this is the rule.
Give me a kiss
and hurry to school.
If you want to sleep instead,
I won’t wake you sleepyhead!
A more literal translation might run thus:
A wheel, wheel
of bread and cinnamon.
Give me a kiss
and go away to school.
And if you don’t want to go,
lie down to sleep!
• illustrations by Viví Escrivá for ¡Pío Peep! by Alma Flor Ada, F. Isabel Campoy, and Alice Schertle •
August 12, 2014