Poetry in the everyday

You know, I’m a big believer that there is poetry in everyday things. Case in point, today I was working with one of my students and he was having trouble understanding the word “sympathy.” Which makes sense. For German learners of English, "sympathy" is a false friend. Germans often think that our word “sympathy” is the same as their word “sympathisch,” when it isn’t. “Sympathisch” means “likeable," "easy going.” So, for example, “Er ist ein sympathischer Typ” translates to, “He is a likeable guy.” Fine. The problem occurs when a German speaking English says, “Oh, Frank…? Frank is great. He’s a real sympathetic guy.” You see? It doesn’t work.

Anyway, so there I was trying to explain to my student how "sympathy" is a false friend. Doing so wasn't really all that hard, but then he decided to throw in the word "empathy," to ask what exactly that word meant. And then shortly thereafter, he was having questions about the word "compassion." Things were getting super tricky. So instead of trying to explain it all orally, which really would have been cumbersome, I decided to write out example sentences for him, so he could see the words in action.

It's funny, they say a picture is worth a thousand words. I really feel as though an example is, at least in language teaching. At any rate, after I wrote all the example sentences for him, I noticed that the little chunk of text I had produced really had some poetry in it. I hope you think so, too.

sympathy = Her husband just died. That must be awful. I'm sorry for her. empathy = Sarah, I'm so sorry that your husband just died. My husband died two years ago, and I know exactly how that feels. Sarah, it's going to be hard, but you will be OK. I never thought that I was going to be OK, but I'm better. compassion = I'm so sorry that your husband died. You know what, you don't have to come into work today or next week. And you will still be paid. I want you to take this time for yourself. Don't worry. We'll find someone to do the work.