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Nonsense Poems

Author Index

Author - A [Index]	Anonymous See Also: Traditional		How to treat Grandma I Said Madrid Spelling The Sneeze Twickenham
Author - B [Index]	Hilaire Belloc		George
	Isabel Frances Bellows		The Ichthyosaurus
	John Bennett		The Ingenious Little Old Man
	Palmer Brown		The Spangled Pandemonium
	Jerce Bullmer		That Head
Author - C [Index]	John Ciardi		The Happy Family
	William Cole		A Song of Thanks
Author - F [Index]	Eleanor Farjeon		The Witch
	Michael Flanders		The Sloth
Author - G [Index]	Harry Graham		Uncle Unselfishness
Author - H [Index]	A. E. Housman		Hallelujah!
Author - I [Index]	Wallace Irwin		The Cares of a Caretaker
Author - L [Index]	Clara Odell Lyon		Winkelman Von Winkel
Author - M [Index]	Spike Milligan		Down the Stream the Swans All Glide Go North, South, East and West, Young Man
Author - N [Index]	Ogden Nash		The Panther Portrait of the Artist as a Prematurely Old Man The Terrible People
Author - R [Index]	James Reeves		Mr Kartoffel
	Alexander Resnikoff		Josephine
	Theodore Roethke		Excerpt from The Monotony Song
Author - S [Index]	Robert Service		Chorus from The Bread-Knife Ballad
	Shel Silverstein		If I had a Brontosaurus Rain Sick Vegetables
Author - T [Index]	John Bannister Tabb		Fascination
	Roslyn Taylor		A-Tissue Beasties Large and Small Flipped Sagacity There's Nothing to Eat in this House, Mum! Wrong Recipe
	Bert Leston Taylor		Gentle Doctor Brown
	(Traditional) See also: Anonymous		A Norrible Tale We Three Kings As I was Standing in the Street
Author - W [Index]	Paul West		The Cumberbunce
Author - V [Index]	Luis d'Antin van Rooten		Chacun Gille

Rain

[Poem removed]

-- Shel Silverstein

Excerpt from The Monotony Song

My Sweetheart is an ugly witch
And you should see her noses twitch
But Goodness Me, her father's rich!
  -And I'm not Hugh nor Harry!

-- Theodore Roethke

A Song of Thanks

It's sensible that icicles
Hang downward as they grow,
For I should hate to step on one
That's buried in the snow.

It's really best that tides come in
And then return to sea;
For if they kept on coming in,
How wet we all would be!

I've often thought tomatoes are
Much better red than blue.
A blue tomato is a food
I'd certainly eschew.

It's best of all that everyone's
So tolerant today
That I can write this sort of stuff
And not get put away.

-- William Cole

Winkelman Von Winkel

Winkelman Von Winkel is the wisest man alive,
He knows that one and one make two, and two and three make five;
He knows that water runs down hill, that the sun sets in the west,
And that for winter weather wear, one's winter clothes are best;
In fact he does not mingle much with common folk around,
Because his learning is so great - his wisdom so profound.

-- Clara Odell Lyon

The Spangled Pandemonium

The spangled pandemonium
Is missing form the zoo.
He bent the bars the barest bit,
And slithered glibly through.

He crawled across the moated wall,
He climbed the mango tree,
And the the keeper scrambled up,
He nipped him in the knee.

To all of you a warning
Not to wander after dark,
Or if you must, make very sure
You stay out of the park.

For the spangled pandemonium
Is missing from the zoo,
And since he nipped his keeper,
He would just as soon nip you!

-- Palmer Brown

Three Hens

When three hens go a-walking, they
Observe this order and array:
The first hen walks in front, and then
Behind her walks the second hen,
While, move they slow or move they fast,
You find the third hen walking last.

-- Henry Johnstone

The Ingenious Little Old Man

A little old man of the sea
Went out in a boat for a sail,
The water came in
Almost up to his chin
And he had nothing which which to bail.

But this little old man of the sea
Just drew out his jackknife so stout,
And a hole with its blade
In the bottom he made,
So that all of the water ran out.

-- John Bennett

The Ichthyosaurus

There once was an Ichthyosaurus,
Who lived when the earth was all porous,
Be he fainted with shame
When he first heard his name,
And departed a long time before us.

-- Isabel Frances Bellows

Josephine

Josephine, Josephine,
The meanest girl I've ever seen.
Her eyes are red, her hair is green
And she takes baths in gasoline.

-- Alexander Resnikoff

Gentle Doctor Brown

It was a gentle sawbones and his name was Doctor Brown.
His auto was the terror of a small suburban town.
His practice, quite amazing for so trivial a place,
Consisted of the victims of his homicidal pace.

So constant was his practice and so high his motor's gear
That at knocking down pedestrians he never had a peer;
But it must, in simple justice, be as truly written down
That no man could be more thoughtful than gentle Doctor Brown.

Whatever was the errand on which Doctor Brown was bent
He'd stop to patch a victim up and never charged a cent.
He'd always pause, whoever 'twas he happened to run down:
A humane and a thoughtful man was gentle Doctor Brown.

"How fortunate," he would observe, "How fortunate 'twas I
That knocked you galley-west and heard your wild and wailing cry.
There are some heartless wretches who would leave you here alone,
Without a sympathetic ear to catch your dying moan.

"Such callousness," said Doctor Brown, "I cannot comprehend'
To fathom such indifference I simply don't pretend.
One ought to do his duty, and I never am remiss.
A simple word of thanks is all I ask. Here, swallow this!"

Then, reaching in the tonneau, he'd unpack his little kit,
And perform an operation that was workmanlike and fit.
"You may survive," said Doctor Brown; "it's happened once or twice.
If not you've had the benefit of competent advice."

Oh, if all our motormaniacs were equally humane,
How little bitterness there'd be, or reason to complain!
How different our point of view if we were ridden down
By lunatics as thoughtful as gentle Doctor Brown!

-- Bert Leston Taylor

Wrong Recipe

The vichyssoise is almost chilled,
The salad's crisp and crunchy,
The duck l'orange smells divine,
The apple pie looks muchy,
The coffee's brewing on the stove,
The Riesling's my love potion -
Surely when he's had his fill
He'll speak of his devotion?

I scrape the plates, I clear the decks,
I glumly fill the dregs-can.
I should have know it (damn his eyes!) -
He was a steak-and-eggs man.

-- Roslyn Taylor

The Witch

The witch! The witch!
Don't let her get you!
Or your Aunt wouldn't know you
The next time she met you!

-- Eleanor Farjeon

The Cumberbunce

I strolled beside the shining sea,
I was as lonely as could be;
No one to cheer me in my walk
But stones and sand, which cannot talk -
Sand and stones and bits of shell,
Which never have a thing to tell.

But as I sauntered by the tide
I saw a something at my side,
A something green, and blue, and pink,
And brown, and purple, too, I think.
I would not say how large it was;
I would not venture that because
It took me rather by surprise,
And I have not the best of eyes.

Should you compare it to a cat,
I'd say it was as large as that;
Or should you as me if the thing
Was smaller than a sparrow's wing,
I should be apt to think you knew,
And simple answer, "Very true!"
Well, as I looked upon the thing,
It murmured, "Please, sir, can I sing?"
And then I knew its name at once -
It plainly was a Cumberbunce.

You are amazed that I could tell
The creatures name so quickly? Well,
I knew it was not a paper doll,
A pencil or a parasol,
A tennis racket or a cheese,
And, as it was not one of these,
And I am not a perfect dunce -
It had to be a Cumberbunce!

With pleading voice and tearful eye
It seemed as though about to cry.
It looked so pitiful and sad
It made me feel extremely bad.
My heart was softened to the thing
That asked me if it, please, could sing.

Its little hand I longed to shake,
But, oh, it had no hand to take!
I bent and drew the creature near,
And whispered in its pale-blue ear,
"What! Sing, my Cumberbunce? You can!
Sing on, sing loudly, little man!"

The Cumberbunce, without ado,
Gazed sadly on the ocean blue,
And, lifting up its little head,
In tones of awful longing, said:

"Oh, I would sing of mackerel skies,
And why the sea is wet,
Of jellyfish and conger eels,
And things that I forget.
And I would hum a plaintive tune
Of why the waves are hot
As boiling water on a stove,
Excepting that they're not!

"And I would sing of hooks and eyes,
And why the sea is slant,
And gaily tips the little ships,
Excepting that I can't!
I never sang a single song,
I never hummed a note.
There is in me no melody,
No music in my throat.

"So that is why I do not sing
Of sharks, or whales, or anything!"

I looked in innocent surprise,
My wonder showing in my eyes.
"Then why, O Cumberbunce," I cried,
"Did you come walking at my side
And ask me if you, please, might sing,
When you could not warble anything?"

"I did not ask permission, sir,
I really did not, I aver.
You, sir, misunderstood me, quite.
I did not ask you if I might.
Had you correctly understood,
You'd know I asked you if I could
So, as I cannot sing a song,
Your answer, it is plain, was wrong.
The fact I could not sing I knew,
But wanted your opinion, too."

A voice came softly o'er the lea.
"Farewell! My mate is calling me!"
I saw the creature disappear,
Its voice, in parting, smote my ear -
"I thought all people understood
The difference 'twixt 'might' and 'could'!"

-- Paul West

Go North, South, East and West, Young Man

Drake is going West, lads,
So Tom is going East;
But tiny Fred
Just lies in bed,
The lazy little beast.

-- Spike Milligan

A-Tissue

If you ask me (which of course you won't) I would say
   the two great boons that science has bestowed on
   mankind's female issue
Are her washing apparatus and the handy paper tissue.
I now qualify that statement
Without fear of a debatement
By adding you should keep the two quite separate
   and alone,
Disasters that follow their coming together being well
   and truly known.
Picture our diligent housewife on Monday's chilly morn
Ratting through the cupboards for the clothes that have
   been worn,
Giving pocket linings and knicker legs the works
And other hiding places where the fiendish tissue lurks.
Despite this careful scrutiny
There's surely grounds for mutiny
When all the clothes get measled with a snow of
   mangled paper -
How can she view this kindly, as a jolly little caper?
Having spent a day or more picking off the fragments
We really cannot blame her if she tears the clothes to ragments.
Is it any wonder, friends, her temper rages hot?
How many fuming mums out there would help her burn the lot?

-- Roslyn Taylor

Vegetables

-- Shel Silverstein

If I had a Brontosaurus

[Poem removed]

-- Shel Silverstein

That Head

I suppose I've passed him a hundred times,
  but I always stop for a minute
And look at his head, that tragic head,
  the head with nobody in it.

-- Jerce Bullmer

Fascination

Among your many playmates here,
How is it that you all prefer
  Your little friend, my dear?
"Because, Mamma, though hard we try,
Not one of us can spit so high,
  And catch it in his ear."

-- John Bannister Tabb

Beasties Large and Small

The gentleman who designed my previous kitchen
   is unknown to me and nameless
Which does not mean that I hold him blameless,
For he decreed that there should be a gap just
   one inch wide
Between the stove and the bench it stood beside.
The gruesome things that can drip, drop, dribble
   and drain down such a region
Are legion.
Who knows what horrid creatures wallow
In this dank disgusting hollow?
If there is justice in the Afterlife
This guy has sure earned lots of strife
Such as row upon row of tiny abysses
Between the benches and cooking dishes
Which he's forced to scrub with a tiny brush
While his probing fingers twist and crush
In ungetattable nooks and crannies
Around the greasy pots and pannies
In which the bacon fat can fall
And little beasties creep and crawl ...

I am never benign
About kitchen design,
Tending to ask, before I have seen it,
'Who's going to clean it?'

-- Roslyn Taylor

Hallelujah!

"Hallelujah!" was the only observation
That escaped Lieutenant-Colonel Mary Jane,
When she tumbled off the platform in the station
And was cut in little pieces by the train.
    Mary Jane, the train is through yer!
    Hallelujah!  Hallelujah!
We shall gather up the fragments that remain.

-- A. E. Housman

Uncle

Uncle, whose inventive brains
Kept evolving aeroplanes,
Fell from an enormous height
On my garden lawn last night.
Flying is a fatal sport;
Uncle wrecked the tennis court.

-- Harry Graham

The Sloth

A Bradypus or Sloth am I,
I live a life of ease,
Contented not to do or die
But idle as I please.
I have three toes on either foot
(Or half a doz. on both)
With leaves and fruits and shoots to eat...
How sweet to be a Sloth!

The world is such a cheerful place
When view from upside down,
It makes a rise of every fall,
A smile of every frown!
I watch the fleeting flutter by
Of butterfly or moth -
And think of all the things I'd try
If I were not a Sloth.

I could climb the very highest Himalayas,
Be among the greatest ever tennis players,
Always win at chess,
Marry a Princess,
Study hard and be an eminent professor,
Or I could be a millionaire,
Play the clarinet, travel everywhere,
Learn to cook,
Catch a crook,
Win  a war then write a book
About it; I could paint a Mona Lisa,
Be another Caesar,
Compose an oratorio that was sublime...
The door's not shut
On my genius but -
I just don't have the time.

For days and days among the trees
I sleep and dream and doze,
Just gently swaying in the breeze
Suspended by my toes;
While eager beavers overhead
Rush through the undergrowth,
I watch the clouds beneath my feet...
How sweet to be a Sloth!

-- Michael Flanders

We Three Kings

We three kings of Orient are,
One in a taxi,
One in a car,
One in a scooter,
Blowing his hooter,
Smoking a big cigar

-- Traditional

Sagacity

Despair to my mother was I in my youth,
For I was considered inept and uncouth;
Unkempt and unruly
Was infant Yours Truly.

Throughout tempestuous puberty
She battled my uncoutherty,
And with a stern unfoolishness
Coped with my unrulishness.

My mother (flushed with her success)
Then tackled my unkemptliness
And with relentless recitude
Conquered my ineptitude.

How well my mother schooled me,
How well my mother fooled me,
At last I've discovered the terrible truth -
It's no fun being ept, kempt, ruly or couth.

-- Roslyn Taylor

Mr Kartoffel

Mr Kartoffel's a whimsical man;
He drinks his beer from a watering can,
And for no good reason that I can see
He fills his pockets with china tea.
He parts his hair with a knife and fork
And takes his ducks on a Sunday walk.
Says he, "If my wife and I should choose
To wear our stockings outside our shoes,
Plant tulip bulbs in the baby's pram
And eat tobacco instead of jam
And fill the bath with cauliflowers,
That's nobody's business at all but ours."
Says Mrs. K., "I may choose to travel
With a sack of grass or a sack of gravel,
Or paint my toes, one black, one white,
Or sit on a bird's nest half the night -
But whatever I do that is rum or rare,
I rather think that is my affair.
So fill up your pockets with stamps and string,
And let us be ready for anything!"
Says Mr. K. to his whimsical wife,
"How can we face the storms of life,
Unless we are ready for anything?
So if you've provided the stamps and the string,
Let us pump up the saddle and harness the horse
And fill him with carrots and custard and sauce,
Let us leap on him lightly and give him a shove
And it's over the sea and away, my love!"

-- James Reeves

Down the Stream the Swans All Glide

Down the stream the swans all glide;
It's quite the cheapest way to ride.
Their legs get wet,
Their tummies wetter:
I think after all
The bus is better.

-- Spike Milligan

Unselfishness

All those who see my children say,
  "What sweet, what kind, what charming elves!"
They are so thoughtful, too, for they
  Are always thinking of themselves.
It must be ages since I ceased
to wonder which I liked the least.

Such is their generosity,
  That, when the roof began to fall,
They would not share the risk with me,
  But said, "No, father, take it all!"
Yet I should love them more, I know,
If I did not dislike them so.

-- Harry Graham

Spelling

Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard and sounds like bird.
And dead: it's said like bed, not bead;
For goodness' sake, don't call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat.
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.)
A moth is not a moth in mother,
Nor both in bother, broth in brother.

-- Anonymous

Flipped

I used to laugh at love in bloom;
Now I'm howling at the moon.
Love has grabbed me round the gullet.
Love has stunned me like a mullet.
Admire your brain, adore your body -
Love has clubbed me with a waddy.
What did I do to be so lucky
To have you for my rubber ducky?
My manuscript will go quite soon
Addressed to Messrs Mills and Boon -
Newcomer I, adrift in heartland,
Move over passé Barbara Cartland.

-- Roslyn Taylor

Chorus from The Bread-Knife Ballad

Please, Mother, don't stab Father with the bread-knife.
Remember 'twas a gift when you were wed.
But if you must stab Father with the bread-knife,
Please, Mother, use another for the bread.

-- Robert Service

A Norrible Tale

A norrible tale I'm going to tell
Of the woeful tragedy which befell
A family that once resided
In the very same thoroughfare as I did;

Indeed it is a norrible tale,
'Twill make your faces all turn pale,
And your cheeks with tears will be overcome,
Tweedle twaddle, tweedle twaddle twum.

The father in the garden went to walk,
And he cut his throat with a piece of chalk;
The mother, at this was so cut-up
She drowned herself in the water-butt.

The eldest sister, on bended knees
Strangled herself with toasted cheese;
The eldest brother, a charming fella,
Blew out his brains with a gingham umbrella.

The innocent infant lying in the cradle,
Shot itself dead with a silver ladle;
And the maid-servant, not knowing what she did,
Strangled herself with the saucepan lid.

The cat sitting down by the kitchen fire,
Chewed up the fender and did expire;
And a fly on the ceiling - the case is the worst 'un -
Blew itself up with spontaneous combustion.

Now this here family of which I've sung,
If they had not dies should have all been hung;
For had they ne'er done themselves any wrong
Why, they might have been here to have heard this song.

-- Old English music hall song

The Cares of a Caretaker

A nice old lady by the sea
Was neat as she was plain,
And every time the tide came in
She swept it back again.

And when the sea untidy grew
And waves began to beat,
She took her little garden rake
And raked it smoot and neat.

She ran a carpet-sweeper up
And down the pebbly sand.
She said, 'This is the only way
To keep it clean - good land!'

And when the gulls came strolling by,
She drove them shrilly back.
Remarking that it spoiled the beach,
'The way them birds do track.'

She fed the catfish clotted cream
And taught it how to purr -
And were a catfish so endowed
She would have stroked its fur.

She stopped the little sea-urchins
That travelled by in pairs,
And washed their dirty faces clean
And combed their little hairs.

She spread white napkins on the surf
With which she fumed and fussed
'When it ain't covered up,' she said,
It gits all over dust.'

She didn't like to see the ships
WIth all the waves act free,
And so she got a painted sign
Which read: Keep off the Sea.

But dust and splutter as she might,
Her work was sadly vain;
However oft she swept the beach,
The tides came in again.

And she was sometimes wan and worn
When she retired to bed -
'A woman's work ain't never done,'
That nice old lady said.

-- Wallace Irwin

Twickenham

There was a young lady of Twickenham
Whose boots were too tight to walk quickenham.
    She bore them awhile,
    But at last, at a stile,
She pulled them both off and was sickenham.

-- Anonymous

The Happy Family

Before the children say goodnight,
    Mother, Father, stop and think:
Have you screwed their heads on tight?
    Have you washed their ears with ink?

Have you said and done and thought
    All that earnest parents should?
Have you beaten them as you ought:
    Have you begged them to be good?

And above all - when you start
    Out the door and douse the light -
Think, be certain, search your heart:
    Have you screwed their heads on tight?

If they sneeze when they're asleep,
    Will their little heads come off?
If they just breathe very deep?
    If - especially - they cough?

Should - alas! - the little dears
    Lose a little head or two,
Have you inked their little ears:
    Girls' ears pink and boys' ears blue?

Children's heads are very loose.
    Mother, Father, screw them tight.
If you feel uncertain use
    A monkey wrench, but do it right.

If a head should come unscrewed
    You will know that you have failed.
Doubtful cases should be glued.
    Stubborn cases should be nailed.

Then when all your darlings go
    Sweetly screaming off to bed,
Mother, Father, you may know
    Angels guard each little head.

Come the morning you will find
    One by one each little head
Full of gentle thoughts and kind,
    Sweetly screaming to be fed.

-- John Ciardi

As I was Standing in the Street

As I was standing in the street,
As quiet as could be,
A great big ugly man came up
And tied his horse to me.

-- American folk rhyme

How to treat Grandma

When Grandma visits you, my dears,
Be good as you can be;
Don't put hot waffles in her ears,
Or beetles in her tea.

Don't sew a pattern on her cheek
With worsted or with silk;
Don't call her naughty names in Greek,
Or spray her face with milk.

Don't drive a staple in her foot,
Don't stick pins in her head;
And, oh, I beg you, do not put
Live embers in her bed.

These things are not considered kind;
The worry her, and tease -
Such cruelty is not refined
It always fails to please.

Be good to Grandma, little chaps,
Whatever else you do;
And then she'll grow to be - perhaps -
More tolerant of you.

-- Anonymous

The Panther

The panther is like a leopard,
Except it hasn't been peppered.
Should you behold a panther crouch,
Prepare to say Ouch.
Better yet, if called by a panther,
Don't anther.

-- Ogden Nash

George

George, who played with a dangerous toy, and suffered a catastrophe of Considerable dimensions

When George's Grandmamma was told
That George had been as good as Gold,
She promised in the Afternoon
To buy him an Immense BALLOON.

And so she did; but when it came,
It got into the candle flame,
And being of a dangerous sort
Exploded with a loud report!
The Lights went out! The Windows Broke!
The Room was filled with reeking smoke,
And in the darkness shrieks and yells
Were mingled with Electric Bells,
And falling masonry and groans,
And crunching, as of broken bones,
And dreadful shrieks, when, worst of all,
The House itself began to fall!
It tottered, shuddering to and fro,
Then crashed into the street below -
Which happened to be Saville Row.

When Help arrived, among the Dead
Were Cousin Mary, Little Fred,
The Footmen (both of them), the Groom,
The man that cleaned the Billiard-Room,
The Chaplain, and the Still-Room Maid.
And I am dreadfully afraid
That Monsieur Champignon, the Chef,
Will now be permanently deaf -
And both his Aides are much the same;
While George, who was in part to blame,
Received, you will regret to hear,
A nasty lump behind the ear.

Moral

The moral is that little Boys
Should not be given dangerous Toys.

-- Hilaire Belloc

Portrait of the Artist as a Prematurely Old Man

It is common knowledge to every schoolboy and even every
   Bachelor of Arts,
That all sin is divided into two parts.
One kind of sin is called a sin of commission, and that is very important,
And it is what you are doing when you are doing something that you oortant,
And the other kind of sin is just the opposite and is called a sin of
   omission and is equally bad in the eyes of all
   right-thinking people, from Billy Sunday to Buddha,
And it consists of not having done something you shuddha.
I might as well give you my opinion of these two kinds of sin as long as,
   in a way, against each other we are pitting them,
And that is, don't bother your heads about sins of commission because
   however sinful, they must at least be fun or else
   you wouldn't be committing them.
It is the sin of omission, the second kind of sin,
That lays eggs under your skin.
The way you get really painfully bitten
Is by the insurance you haven't taken out and the checks you haven't
   added up the stubs of and the appointments you
   haven't kept and the bills you haven't paid and the
   letters you haven't written.
Also, about sins of omission there is one particularly painful lack of beauty,
Namely, it isn't as though it had been a riotous red-letter day or
   night every time you neglected to do your duty;
You didn't get a wicked forbidden thrill
Every time you let a policy lapse or forgot to pay a bill;
You didn't slap the lad in the tavern on the back and loudly cry Whee,
Let's all fail to write just one more letter before we go home,
   and this round of unwritten letters is on me.
No, you never get any fun
Out of the things you haven't done,
But they are the things that I do not like to be amid,
Because the suitable things you didn't do give you a lot more trouble
   than the unsuitable things you did.
The moral is that it is probably better not to sin at all, but if
   some kind of sin you must be pursuing,
Well, remember to do it by doing rather than by not doing.

-- Ogden Nash

Madrid

There was an old man of Madrid
Who ate sixty-five eggs for a quid.
    When they asked, 'Are you faint?'
    He replied, 'No I ain't,
But I don't feel as well as I did.'

-- Anonymous

Sick

[Poem removed]

-- Shel Silverstein

Chacun Gille

-- Luis d'Antin van Rooten

The Sneeze

I sneezed a sneeze into the air
It fell to the earth I know not where
But hard and froze were the looks of those
In whose vicinity I snoze.

-- Anonymous

The Terrible People

People who have what they want are very fond of telling people who haven't
   what they want that they really don't want it,
And I wish I could afford to gather all such people into a gloomy
   castle on the Danube and hire half a dozen capable
   Draculas to haunt it.
I don't mind their having a lot of money, and I don't care how they employ it,
But I do think that they damn well ought to admit they enjoy it.
But no, they insist on being stealthy
About the pleasures of being wealthy,
And the possession of a handsome annuity
Makes them think that to say how hard it is to make both ends meet
   is their bounden duity.
You cannot conceive of an occasion
Which will find them without some suitable evasion.
Yes indeed, with arguments they are very fecund;
Their first point is that money isn't everything, and that they have
   no money anyhow is their second.
Some people's money is merited,
And other people's is inherited,
But wherever it comes from,
They talk about it as if it were something you got pink gums from.
Perhaps indeed the possession of wealth is constantly distressing,
But I should be quite happy to assume every curse of wealth if I could
   at the same time assume every blessing.
The only uncurable troubles of the rich are the troubles that money can't cure,
Which is a kind of trouble that is even more troublesome if you are poor.
Certainly there are lots of things in life that money won't buy, but it's very funny -
Have you ever tried to buy them without money?

-- Ogden Nash

I Said

I said, 'This horse, sir, will you shoe?'
And soon the horse was shod.
I said, 'This deed, sir, will you do?'
And soon the deed was dod!

I said, 'This stick, sir, will you break?'
At once the stick he broke.
I said, 'This coat, sir, will you make?'
And soon the coat he moke!

-- Anonymous

The Hunter

I have fought against the poodle with his gory, deadly paws;
I have faced the fearsome kitten, wild and bony,
And somehow I've evaded the enormous chomping jaws
Of the frighteningly ferocious Shetland pony.

My triumph o'er the rabbit is now sung throughout the land,
And men still speak in whispers of the day
When, attacked by twelve mosquitoes, with my one unwounded hand,
I killed nine of them and dove the rest away.

I have faced the housefly in his lair, I have stalked the ladybug
And the caterpillar, grim and fierce and hairy;
That trophy there is bumblebee, and this, my favourite rug,
Has been fashioned from the hide of a canary.

I have dove into the ocean to do combat with a shrimp,
I have dared the hen to come on out and fight;
I have battled with the butterfly (that's why I have this limp),
And I slew a monstrous grubworm just last night.

But this evening I must sally forth to meet the savage moth,
And if I don't come back in time for tea,
You shall know that I fell gallantly, as gallantly I fought
So please be gentle when you speak of me.

-- Author Unknown

There's Nothing to Eat in this House, Mum!

Hie you to the market, Mother.
Buy some food that's fit to eat.
All we have is eggs and butter,
Fruit and vegies, milk and meat.

What we need is you-beaut tucker:
Kentucky Fried and sausage rolls,
Chickenburgers, chips and chocolate,
Dim sims, doughnuts, icy poles ...

Hie you to the market, Mother.
Buy the food that brings such joy
To the pit that has no bottom -
Your ever-starving teenage boy.

-- Roslyn Taylor

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