Lexiconlover's 30 Day Book Challenge

This is in response to lexiconlover ’s 30 Day Book Challenge. With steely determination, I’ve worked my way up to Day 4: Favorite children's book.

Not have been a child for a while, and not having kidlets to read to, I’m sure there are books that I’m overlooking, but the one that sticks out in my mind is The Golden Treasury of Poetry by Louis Untermeyer. I had a hardback copy with a tree on the front of it. The title is dreadful and belies all the good fun stuff that lies within. According to amazon, it was published in 1959.

I’m pretty sure I haven’t read any of it since high school. It’s full not only of poetry, but jokes (in poem form, of course), stories of High Adventure, love poems and silly stuff.

A few years ago, there was a song that was popular based on Alfred Noyes poem “ The Highwayman .” I can’t remember the artist or the song title. (not Willie Nelson’s “The Highwayman.” It was a female singer.) The chorus nearly the same as repeated lines from the poem, which are:

Look for me by moonlight;

Watch for me by moonlight;

I’ll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way!

The story was basically the same, too. It’s one of the poems in the book.

But my favorite is a series that begin with “Mommy! Mommy!” Mommy responds with “Shut up!” This sounds aggressive, but it’s goofy.

“Mommy! Mommy! I don’t want to go to South America!”

“Shut up and get your other foot into the CARE package!”

“Mommy! Mommy! What’s a vampire?”

“Shut up and finish your soup before it clots!”

Yeah, I was corrupted early.

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books

poetry

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© 2015 Denise Longrie

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