Woodman, spare that tree!All right, fine, I’ll harm it not!
Although it’s clearly got the rot.
You needn’t threaten me–I’ll go!
But first, there’s something you should know:
When comes a storm, this tree will fall
Upon your house, and crush you all:
Your mother, father, sisters too,
Will all be dead because of you.
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When a baby meets a baby
Coming through the rye
Says the baby to the baby
I must poke you in the eye.
When a baby meets a baby
Walking through the wheat
Says the baby to the baby
I must tread upon your feet
When a baby meets a baby
And the baby says Hello
They may play until the baby says
It’s time for you to go.
When a baby meets a baby
Coming through the corn
Says the baby to the baby
You will wish you weren’t born
When a baby meets a baby
And the babies start to play
They will play until the baby says
It’s time to go away.
So when a baby meets a baby
Coming through the rye
Says the baby to the baby
Better pass the baby by.
Flim was thin as a chicken wing
Flam was fat as a toad.
Flim walked east and Flam walked north
They met along the western road.
Flam had a bag of noodles;
He spilt them on the ground.
Flim just smiled and shook his hand
And gave his head a friendly pound.
And both of them were in the way
And neither stepped aside
So no one else could come along
To offer either one a ride.
Flam was bowing from the waist
Clicking his heels together
Flim was staring at the sky
Wondering about the weather.
And both of them were in the way
And both were at a loss.
And neither one would give an inch
So both of them were cross.
Flam was standing in the path
And fussing with his hat
Flim was sitting diligently
Where the ground was nice and flat.
And no one cared to solve the mess
And no one cared to stay
And what with one thing and another
That is how things are today.
I.
Polytentacular, it grips
And rends to flinders passing ships.
II.
By covering itself with sand,
The Kraken poses as a Land—
And rises with an awful roar
When hapless sailors come ashore,
Till falling back, it drags them down
To whirl and spin, and fail, and drown.
III.
A dozen years have come and gone
Since when I held the watch at dawn
And through the water clear as air
Saw my own shadow riding there;
And stared into the glassy sea
As jelly eyes stared up at me.
Lily Lake
Loved her snake.
Leroy Lay
Stole it away.
Lucas Lops
Called the cops.
Laura Leaf
Chased the thief.
Lenny Loun
Knocked him down.
Lamia Lake
(That was the snake)
Swallowed him whole.
That’s all.
Down by the hill, or lower down,
The larks and lizards built a town.
They sang for fun and lay in the sun
And life was easy.
Seasons came, and came, and came,
And some were different, some the same;
The flowers grew, and blossomed, and blew,
And life was easy.
But a lark grows bold to stretch its wing
While a lizard sleeps and dreams of spring.
So the larks forgot – what the lizards did not –
That life is easy.
Then they went their ways, no one knew why,
Some to the desert and some to the sky,
With the turning spheres and the passing years,
Like life, so easy.
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She jumped up high but fell into a hole
As deep as night, as dark as low.
She climbed back out, it took all day.
By then her friends had gone away:
Some to build,
Some to earn,
Some to gather things to burn.
Some to work,
Some to school,
Some to follow the golden rule.
She laughed, and got on out of there.
But she kept the hole as a souvenir.
on the waterside path
by the levy familiar geese
gaggle along
while a fat boy rests on the bridge
while his backpack rests beside him on the bridge
while the train goes by
that jackrabbit lolloping headlong
that reaches cover in the tall grass
and runs out the other side of the tall grass
toward the shack with walls no longer square
whose roof is rows of weathered slats that gap
to sunlight and the morning air
while two crows black and black
perch atop two dirty chunks of broken concrete
upon a low mound of broken concrete
and me watching
me watching
as if my heart would break
I wanted some ice cream
Look what I got:
Rodents ’round a big milk pot.
(Do I want mice cream? I do not!)
I asked for chocolate chips
So how
Did I get a gooey garbage scow?
(A chocolate ship? No, thanks, not now!)
That’s two wishes gone, and just one left.
I wish this genie wasn’t deaf!
Jimmy, Oh Jimmy, jumped into the jakes.
Why’d he do it? Goodness sakes!
When his teacher pulled him out
All the children commenced to shout:
Jimmy, Oh Jimmy, why did you do it?
See that hole and jump into it?
You’ll have to move far, far away
For no one will marry you after today!
Bag of Anything 