Today’s program takes a look at early poems – by the Lithuanian poet Nijole Milauskaite and by me (poems I wrote when I was 16 and 17) – and considers the idea that lyric poets often write about themselves in their early works because they seek to create a sense of themselves for themselves and not only for their readers. Such early writing is not just an impulse to reveal hidden secrets and personal or family histories but to create a foundation for personal as well as future artistic development.