Song for a Little House
Christopher Morley
I'm glad our house is a little house,
Not too tall nor too wide:
I'm glad the hovering butterflies
Feel free to come inside.
Our little house is a friendly house,
It is not shy or vain;
It gossips with the talking trees
And makes friends with the rain.
And quick leaves cast a shimmer of green
Against our whited walls,
And in the phlox, the courteous bees
Are paying duty calls.
The Secret Cavern
Margaret Widdemer
Underneath the boardwalk, way, way back,
There's a splendid cavern, big and black-
If you want to get there, you must crawl
Underneath the posts and steps and all
When I've finished paddling, there I go-
None of all the other children know!
There I keep my treasures in a box-
Shells and colored glass and queer 'shaped rocks,
In a secret hiding-place I've made,
Hollowed out with clam shells and a spade,
Marked with yellow pebbles in a row-
None of all the other children know!
It's a place that makes a splendid lair,
Room for chests and weapons and one chair.
In the farthest corner, by the stones,
I shall have a flag with skulls and bones
And a lamp that casts a lurid glow-
None of all the other children know!
Some time, by and by, when I am grown,
I shall go and live there all alone;
I shall dig and paddle till it's dark,
Then go out and man my pirate bark:
I shall fill my cave with captive foe-
None of all the other children know!
The Little Rose Tree
Rachel Field
Every rose on the little tree
Is making a different face at me!
Some look surprised when I pass by,
And others droop - but they are shy.
These two whose heads together press
Tell secrets I could never guess.
Some have their heads thrown back to sing,
And all the buds are listening.
I wonder if the gardener knows,
Or if he calls each just a rose?
The Family Dragon
(With acknowledgments to Kenneth Grahame)
Margaret Widdemer
Last night there walked across our lawn a
beast we didn't know-
We saw his little footprints marked quite
plainly in the snow.
It might have been an ocelot, or perhaps a
grizzly bear-
We hoped it was a dragon, come out walk-
ing from its lair;
We didn't want a grown-up one, all fire and
scales and foam,
But just a baby dragonlet that we could carry
home;
We'd keep him in the nursery and give him
a nice name,
And have him for a fam'ly pet, with ribbons
on, quite tame.
We tracked him down the meadow path
and all along the hedge
And there his little footprints stopped close
up beneath the edge,
For there the snow had gone away - there
wasn't any track-
And it was tea-time anyway, so both of us
went back.
But we shall go some day quite soon and find
him in his lair,
And capture him while he's asleep, and tie
him up with care,
And we will have the 'spressman come and
put him in his wagon
And bring him home to stay with us and be
our family dragon!
Sea Shell
Amy Lowell
Sea Shell, Sea Shell,
Sing me a song, O please!
A song of ships, and sailor men,
And parrots, and tropical trees,
Of islands lost in the Spanish Main
Which no man ever may find again,
Of fishes and corals under the waves,
And sea'horses stabled in great green caves.
Sea Shell, Sea Shell,
Sing of the things you know so well.
Where Go the Boats?
Robert Louis Stevenson
Dark brown is the river.
Golden is the sand,
It flows along forever,
With trees on either hand.
Green leaves a'floating,
Castles of the foam,
Boats of mine a'boating-
Where will all come home?
On goes the river
And out past the mill,
Away down the valley,
Away down the hill.
Away down the river,
A hundred miles or more,
Other little children
Shall bring my boats ashore.
Serious Omission
John Farrar
I know that there are dragons,
St. George's, Jason's, too,
And many modern dragons
With scales of green and blue;
But though I've been there many times
And carefully looked through,
I cant find a dragon
In the cages at the zoo!
Farewell to the Farm
Robert Louis Stevenson
The coach is at the door at last;
The eager children, mounting fast
And kissing hands, in chorus sing:
"Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!
"To house and garden, field and lawn,
The meadow-gates we swang upon,
To pump and stable, tree and swing,
Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!
"And fare you well for evermore,
O ladder at the hayloft door,
O hayloft where the cobwebs cling,
Good'bye, good-bye, to everything!"
Crack goes the whip, and off we go;
The trees and houses smaller grow;
Last, round the woody turn we swing;
"Good-bye, good-bye, to everything!"
Bread Making
E. L. M. King
Mother's kneading, kneading dough,
In and out her knuckles go;
Till the sticky, shapeless lump
Grows a pillow, smooth and plump.
Then she cuts it, pops it in
To the neatly buttered tin,
Leaves it rising high and higher,
While she goes to make the fire.
How the glad flames leap and roar,
Through the open oven-door;
Till their hot breath, as they play,
Makes us wink and run away.
When they've burnt to embers red
Mother shovels in the bread;
And that warm, delicious smell
Tells her it is baking well.
When it's golden, just like wheat,
We shall get a crust to eat;
How I wish we could be fed
Every day on new-made bread!
General Store
Rachel Field
Some day I'm going to have a store
With a tinkly bell hung over the door,
With real glass cases and counters wide
And drawers all spilly with things inside.
There'll be a little of everything:
Bolts of calico; balls of string;
Jars of peppermint; tins of tea;
Pots and kettles and crockery;
Seeds in packets; scissors bright;
Kegs of sugar, brown and white;
Sarsaparilla for picnic lunches,
Bananas and rubber boots in bunches.
I'll fix the window and dust each shelf,
And take the money in all myself.
It will be my store and I will say:
"What can I do for you today?"
Little
Dorothy Aldis
I am the sister of him
And he is my brother.
He is too little for us
To talk to each other.
So every morning I show him
My doll and my book;
But every morning he still is
Too little to look.
The Circus
Elizabeth Madox Roberts
Friday came and the circus was there,
And Mother said that the twins and I
And Charles and Clarence and all of us
Could go out and see the parade go by.
And there were wagons with pictures on,
And you never could guess what they had inside,
Nobody could guess, for the doors were shut,
And there was a dog that a monkey could ride.
A man on the top of a sort of cart
Was clapping his hands and making a talk.
And the elephant came- he can step pretty far-
It made us laugh to see him walk.
Three beautiful ladies came riding by,
And each one had on a golden dress,
And each one had a golden whip.
They were queens of Sheba, I guess.
A big wild man was in a cage,
And he had some snakes going over his feet.
And somebody said, "He eats them alive!"
But I didn't see him eat.