Poetry Pause is the League of Canadian Poets’ daily poetry dispatch. Read “What He Taught Was Not Math” by Annika Paradkar, winner of the 2026 Jessamy Stursberg Poetry Prize for Canadian Youth, junior category.

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What He Taught Was Not Math

By Annika Paradkar

for as long as i can remember
my grandfather’s world revolved around two stars

my grandmother
and math

my grandfather was her math tutor
they fell in love

through

sin
cos
tan

permutations
combinations

limits
derivatives

love,
solved step by step

that love of numbers
through numbers

was taught to my father
and to classrooms full of students

my grandfather believed
that this love
should not be locked
by something as ordinary
as money

he gave away classes
knowledge
for free
like it was something to be shared
not sold

even when it meant
saving money
cutting corners
to build a home for the love
he gave to others

he had passed this love to us too
his grandkids

kindergarten
counting numbers
the first building blocks of
something we did not understand yet

soon
addition
subtraction
fractions

lessons at the wooden dining table
turned into video calls
with shaky pictures
of handwritten questions

turned into cardboard boxes of textbooks
crossing oceans
bursting at the seams with
his love
of numbers
through numbers

yearly visits
shrinking a three-story family home
into a smaller apartment in the city
every surface covered with papers
every wall lined with books

this love
fueled him

still running tuition centres
at seventy five

generations of students
learning the same love

i like to believe
that his love will never be forgotten
spanning continents
and so many hearts

and he is still there
in every equation we solve

not gone
just rearranged
into everything he taught us
smiling
his gap-toothed smile

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Copyright © Annika Paradkar

Winner of the 2026 Jessamy Stursberg Poetry Prize for Canadian Youth, junior category.

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