Give Me Your Name!

Give me your name, and I will...

whisper it into the forests,
spell it out in the sand,
I'll shout it over the thunder,
breathe it away on the wind.
I'll spill it over the mountains,
let it echo through the rain;
I'll sing it into a seashell,
if you give me your name.

--Judith Nicholls

Going Hairless

Oh, Dad, why did you do it?
It's just - you look so weird,
Your face looks sort of lonely
Without its fuzzy beard.

I liked your face as it was, Dad,
I liked it covered in hair,
I liked your chin all bristly
Not pink and bald and bare.

Why did you shave if off, Dad?
It doesn't look like you,
Your lips look sort of worried
And not sure what to do.

I'll miss your tickly beard, Dad,
When you come to say goodnight,
I'll miss the way that it prickles
Whenever we have a fight.

My friends all liked your beard, Dad,
I know they'll miss it too,
I'm not sure that they'll recognize
That you are really you.

I bet if you started today, Dad,
It wouldn't take long, I'm sure,
For your beard to be back to normal,
And you'd be my dad once more.

--June Crebbin

Grim and Gloomy

oh, grim and gloomy,
So grim and gloomy
Are the caved beneath the sea.
Oh, rare but roomy
And bare and boomy,
Those salt sea caverns be.

Oh, slim and slimy
Or grey and grimy
Are the animals of the sea.
Salt and oozy
And safe and snoozy
The caves where those animals be.

Hark to the shuffling,
Huge and snuffling,
Ravenous, cavernous, great sea-beasts!
But fair and fabulous,
Tintinnabulous,
Gay and fabulous are their feasts.

Ah, but the queen of the sea,
The querulous, perilous sea!
How the curls of her tresses
The pearls on her dresses,
Sway and swirl in the waves,
How cosy and dozy,
How sweet ring-a-rosy
Her bower in the deep-sea caves!

Oh, rare but roomy
And bare and boomy
Those caverns under the sea,
And grave and grandiose,
Safe and sandiose
The dens of her denizens be.

--James Reeves

Growing Cress in a Polystyrene Trough

A polystyrene trough
Keeps seeds warm
And its thick white walls
Keep them from harm.

The cress seeds we planted
Were small as pencil dots
Spattering the soil
We put in the trough.

It took only two weeks
For them to grow
Into a thick green forest
In walls as white as snow.

--Stanley Cook