Rhyming poetry and my mother

I just got off of the phone with my mother. It was one of those talks that starts off and you think it might be short and then you find yourself off in disparate directions, following different stories and then one of you invariably ends up reciting rhyming poetry. Or rather, that's how this conversation went tonight. I missed Thanksgiving with my family this year, and I apparently missed my Mother and paternal Grandfather reciting "The Cremation of Sam McGee" by Robert Service. Luckily my parents own the complete works of Service, because they needed a little help along the way.

(My Grandpa:) There are strange things done in the midnight sun

(My Mother:) By the men who moil for gold...

It apparently drove off an aunt, but I would have enjoyed to hear it recited.

I can't say that I have that particular poem memorized, but there are others. At one point I knew all of "Casey at Bat" and "The Walrus and the Carpenter," but I've only got scraps of them left in my head. At one point I memorized "The Day Is Done" by Longfellow for a class. It's very long, and I was either trying to be impressive or just a little silly. Probably both. Has reading poems to kids gone out of style? I know that Mother Goose is not as widely read as it once was, which I think is a shame. Learning rhyming poems is good for learning language.

My Great Grandmother and Great Aunt, neither of whom I knew, but who were very important in my Mother's life, were great fans of poetry. They were in a Tennyson society, and Mother has a wonderful picture of the group. I know that many of the poems Mother has memorized are because of these two women. In turn, she read lots of poetry to us as kids. Most of it was children's poems that she knew as a child. Like a family favorite, the puffin poem by Florence Page Jaques.

Oh there once was a puffin,

Just the shape of a muffin,

And he lived on an island

In the bright blue sea.

Mother really preferred the scarier children's poems. Like "Little Orphant Annie" by James Whitcomb Riley, with its ending stanza:

An' little Orphant Annie says, when the blaze is blue,

An' the lamp-wick sputters, an' the wind goes woo-oo!

An' you hear the crickets quit, an' the moon is gray,

An' the lightnin'-bugs in dew is all squenched away,--

You better mind yer parunts, an' yer teachurs fond an' dear,

An' churish them 'at loves you, an' dry the orphant's tear,

An' he'p the pore an' needy ones 'at clusters all about,

Er the Gobble-uns 'll git you

Ef you

Don't

Watch

Out!

When I was little, that poem was very effective. When we were kids, Mom found a book entitled Scary Poems for Rotten Kids, which was totally up her alley. One of her favorites is "The Day the Mosquitoes Ate Angela Jane," which involves this horrible child that piques the interest of the Queen of the Mosquitoes. She decides that the girl's evil blood would strengthen her hoardes, but it's too poisonous for even the bloodsuckers. It's hilarious and grotesque.

I remember finding "The Highwayman" by Alfred Noyes when I was in middle school and reading it aloud with a friend. We loved it and thought it romantic and tragic. Poor Bess, the landlord's daughter.

"Look for me by moonlight,

Watch for me by moonlight,

I'll come to thee by moonlight, though Hell should bar the way."

Comments

[Jeanne]

My dad used to recite "the gobble-uns 'll git you!" to us. I wish I had the self-discipline to memorize poems -- one of the things on my list to do "when I retire" (ha-ha). The only things I can reliably recite are a couple of very short Ogden Nash verses and Tolkien's "The Fall of Gil-galad"!

We've got a number of poetry picture books for the girls, from Seuss to R.L. Stevenson, so I hope we'll broaden our own horizons too, not just theirs.

Loreena McKennitt has set "The Highwayman" to music, have you heard it? -- not the same as hearing it spoken, of course, but still wonderful.

[Kristen]

I second the plug for Loreena McKennitt! She is one of my very favorite musicians. In addition to "The Highwayman," she's also made songs out of "The Lady of Shalott" and several extracts from Shakespeare.

Also, here's a website you might like: www.plagiarist.com

[Dana]

I loved scary poems for rotten kids. I've been trying to find it and didn't think I could but I guess it just has a different cover.