Poet’s Tree – Shel Silverstein

Listen to the mustn’ts child, listen to the don’ts. Listen to the shouldn’ts, the impossible, the won’ts. Listen to the never haves then listen close to me… anything can happen child, anything can be. – Shel Silverstein

Whilst browsing through wordpress I came across the poet Shel Silverstein and his book ‘Where the Sidewalk Ends’ on the blog ‘Free Page Numbers’.
Shamefully this is the first time I’d heard of him and to tell you the truth, now I’m little obsessed! He’s fantastic and I think the poet’s tree fits perfectly snug in my blog!

The Anaconda – Edwin Morgan

Whilst in Glasgow, I was told the scots are very fond of their poetry! So I got on the cheeky google and came across this guy. Unfortunately this book is no longer in print and this is the only poem from the book ‘tales from limerick zoo’ that I could find! However if you know any more please share them with me I’d really appreciate it!

A huge anaconda named Mary
Was told she was wicked and scary.
She swallowed a village
Without any spillage
And said to them, ‘My, that was rare, eh?’
-Edwin Morgan

A Warning on Spontaneous Combustion – Stuart McLean

hey guys! I’ve just arrived in Glasgow, Scotland and I’m getting in the spirit of things with a Scottish poem! Mainly cos I’m bored in my hotel room and have nothing else to do! :p enjoy!

whisky is the king of drinks,
Renowned the world o’er,
But here’s a word o’ caution,
Tae think of when ye pour.
There’s a certain combination,
That tastes so very good,
But when it hits your tummy,
And mixes with your food.
That’s when the trouble starts,
For yer pleasure hits overload,
And half an hour later,
Ye’ll suddenly explode.
So there ye are in the pub,
Completely engulfed in flames,
And yer good wife’s dashing home,
Tae lodge insurance claims.
Well now that I have told ye,
Don’t say ye’ve no’ been warned,
So don’t try it oot yersel’,
Or ye’ll soon be bein’ mourned.

Robot Boy – Tim Burton

A man tells his stories so many times that he becomes the stories. They live on after him, and in that way he becomes immortal. – Big Fish, 2003

The Melancholy Death of Oyster boy – of course I own this book! I’m currently decorating and whilst moving a few things this book fell off my shelf! I read it quite a lot! I admit I am a total Tim Burton fan! I have a shelf of nightmare before Christmas things making me a total nerd! I’m a huge film fan and I love old school Tim, but I enjoy his poetry too. This poem and a couple others inspired me to write Javisnail, after about 3 years of not writing, so I had to make it part of my blog…

Mr. an Mrs. Smith had a wonderful life.
They were a normal, happy husband and wife.
One day they got news that made Mr. Smith glad.
Mrs. Smith would would be a mom
which would make him the dad!
But something was wrong with their bundle of joy.
It wasn’t human at all,
it was a robot boy!
He wasn’t warm and cuddly
and he didn’t have skin.
Instead there was a cold, thin layer of tin.
There were wires and tubes sticking out of his head.
He just lay there and stared,
not living or dead.

The only time he seemed alive at all
was with a long extension cord
plugged into the wall.

Mr. Smith yelled at the doctor,
“What have you done to my boy?
He’s not flesh and blood,
he’s aluminum alloy!”

The doctor said gently,
“What I’m going to say
will sound pretty wild.
But you’re not the father
of this strange looking child.
You see, there still is some question
about the child’s gender,
but we think that its father
is a microwave blender.”

The Smith’s lives were now filled
with misery and strife.
Mrs. Smith hated her husband,
and he hated his wife.
He never forgave her unholy alliance:
a sexual encounter
with a kitchen appliance.

And Robot Boy
grew to be a young man.
Though he was often mistaken
for a garbage can.

The Island of Found Nonsense

So me and Cpsingleon42 had a poem-off, after my story about Curly inspired him to write a great poem (which I have re-blogged for you entertainment) and also we came up with a piece of nonsense together. This is the story of the sabowen and the hermit crab…

They could travel the globe in search of pens,
Because god knows where mine went.
Prob’ly on a little island on its own,
Off the coast of Gwent…

On this island, Is there a cave?
Filled with pens and the odd sock?
Keys and other bits and bobs?
Which other people have lost?

There’s even a bay
Where the lost minds go.
I think ours could be there,
bobbing about on a pedalo.

And perhaps we’ll be cast away,
Out to where Wilson floats
And where marbles and lost patience,
Drift along in sailing boats.

We’ll float with the turtles,
Yearning for rye bread.
And the albatross will tease us
With the thoughts of our bed

And we’ll dream,
Of the normal world,
Of the ordinary and plain,
Til we’re awaken by the crow of the cuckoo bird.

it’ll sit prim and proper,
it’ll tell tales of soup, and
it’ll sing songs of Odysseus
it’ll keep you in in the loop

I’ll light us a fire,
And around it we’d sit,
And I’ll make us an audience,
From coconuts and a stick.

We can give them all names.
One Nutty Anna, one Milky Joe
We’ll eventually go coco-loco,
Like they did on that show.

We’ll sing songs to the stars,
We’ll talk shop to the Moon.
He’ll probably like that,
He’s like us, a loon.

-The original comments can be found on my poem ‘Curly’ I haven’t edited cos I like it how it is!

Be Glad Your Nose is on Your Face – Jack Prelutsky

I have just finished reading this poem for the first time since school. Must say I appreciated it more this time, rather than when we were made to read it and it was uncool! It’s really made me chuckle and as I love nonsense I’m sharing it with you! Enjoy!

Be glad your nose is on your face,
not pasted on some other place,
for if it were where it is not,
you might dislike your nose a lot.

Imagine if your precious nose
were sandwiched in between your toes,
that clearly would not be a treat,
for you’d be forced to smell your feet.

Your nose would be a source of dread
were it attached atop your head,
it soon would drive you to despair,
forever tickled by your hair.

Within your ear, your nose would be
an absolute catastrophe,
for when you were obliged to sneeze,
your brain would rattle from the breeze.

Your nose, instead, through thick and thin,
remains between your eyes and chin,
not pasted on some other place-
be glad your nose is on your face!

The Trouble With Geraniums

A stone set in the labyrinth of Alnwick Gardens, it reads – only dead fish swim with the sea.

I discovered a new poem today that I would like to share with you. The author is Mervyn Peake, a fantastic poet and I have placed his book ‘A book of Nonsense’ high on my list of things to buy. He is also illustrator of classics such as Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland, The Swiss Family Robinson and Treasure Island, but I would like to bring to your attention ‘The Trouble With Geraniums’ simply because I love it…

The trouble with geraniums
is that they’re much too red!
The trouble with my toast is that
it’s far too full of bread.

The trouble with a diamond
is that it’s much too bright.
The same applies to fish and stars
and the electric light.

The troubles with the stars I see
lies in the way they fly.
The trouble with myself is all
self-centred in the eye.

The trouble with my looking-glass
is that it shows me, me;
there’s trouble in all sorts of things
where it should never be.

– Please note this is not my own work, poem can be found at http://www.mervynpeake.org/poet.htm
– The photograph is my own

The Pig – by Roald Dahl

I’ve always been a fan of Roald Dahl, and like many others – read his books religiously as a child. I recently stumbled across his poetry and i think it is totally underrated…

The Pig
In England once there lived a big
And wonderfully clever pig.
To everybody it was plain
That Piggy had a massive brain.
He worked out sums inside his head,
There was no book he hadn’t read.
He knew what made an airplane fly,
He knew how engines worked and why.
He knew all this, but in the end
One question drove him round the bend:
He simply couldn’t puzzle out
What LIFE was really all about.
What was the reason for his birth?
Why was he placed upon this earth?
His giant brain went round and round.
Alas, no answer could be found.
Till suddenly one wondrous night.
All in a flash he saw the light.
He jumped up like a ballet dancer
And yelled, “By gum, I’ve got the answer!”
“They want my bacon slice by slice”
“To sell at a tremendous price!”
“They want my tender juicy chops”
“To put in all the butcher’s shops!”
“They want my pork to make a roast”
“And that’s the part’ll cost the most!”
“They want my sausages in strings!”
“They even want my chitterlings!”
“The butcher’s shop! The carving knife!”
“That is the reason for my life!”
Such thoughts as these are not designed
To give a pig great piece of mind.
Next morning, in comes Farmer Bland,
A pail of pigswill in his hand,
And piggy with a mighty roar,
Bashes the farmer to the floor…
Now comes the rather grizzly bit
So let’s not make too much of it,
Except that you must understand
That Piggy did eat Farmer Bland,
He ate him up from head to toe,
Chewing the pieces nice and slow.
It took an hour to reach the feet,
Because there was so much to eat,
And when he finished, Pig, of course,
Felt absolutely no remorse.
Slowly he scratched his brainy head
And with a little smile he said,
“I had a fairly powerful hunch
“That he might have me for his lunch.
“And so, because I feared the worst,
“I thought I’d better eat him first.”

Behind Imagination There’s Always Great Inspiration

I would like to introduce you to inspiration… Inspiration meet everyone…

I believe the genius’s are not those who study the planet and give a name to something they discover which has simply been there all along. I believe the genius’s are those whose study the land of make believe. The nonsense makers, the dreamers and the people who say “why not?”. These are the movie makers the poets and the writers. The inspirers!

Since being a child I have read the works of Dr. Suess, Roald Dahl, Eion Colfer and J.K Rowling. I have watched the movies from the minds of Tim Burton, Walt Disney and Guillermo Del Toro and been influenced and formed into the proud creative woman that sits writing before you.

I’ve created a section of my blog to express what inspires me to write, what pushes me head first through those writers blocks and sometimes just what makes me smile… Hey, it might even be the little bit of inspiration you’ve just been looking for!