Poetry Appreciation Week

Why Nobody Pets the Lion at the Zoo

by John Ciardi

The morning that the world began
The Lion growled a growl at Man.

And I suspect the Lion might
(If he’d been closer) have tried a bite.

I think that’s as it ought to be
And not as it was taught to me.

I think the Lion has a right
To growl a growl and bite a bite.

And if the Lion bothered Adam,
He should have growled right back at ’im.

The way to treat a Lion right
Is growl for growl and bite for bite.

True, the Lion is better fit
For biting than for being bit.

But if you look him in the eye
You’ll find the Lion’s rather shy.

He really wants someone to pet him.
The trouble is: his teeth won’t let him.

He has a heart of gold beneath
But the Lion just can’t trust his teeth.






Arithmetic

By Carl Sandburg

Arithmetic is where numbers fly like pigeons in and out of your head.Arithmetic tell you how many you lose or win if you know how many you had before you lost or won.Arithmetic is seven eleven all good children go to heaven -- or five six bundle of sticks.Arithmetic is numbers you squeeze from your head to your hand to your pencil to your paper till you get the answer.Arithmetic is where the answer is right and everything is nice and you can look out of the window and see the blue sky -- or the answer is wrong and you have to start all over and try again and see how it comes out this time.If you take a number and double it and double it again and then double it a few more times, the number gets bigger and bigger and goes higher and higher and only arithmetic can tell you what the number is when you decide to quit doubling.Arithmetic is where you have to multiply -- and you carry the multiplication table in your head and hope you won't lose it.If you have two animal crackers, one good and one bad, and you eat one and a striped zebra with streaks all over him eats the other, how many animal crackers will you have if somebody offers you five six seven and you say No no no and you say Nay nay nay and you say Nix nix nix?If you ask your mother for one fried egg for breakfast and she gives you two fried eggs and you eat both of them, who is better in arithmetic, you or your mother?




Summons

By Robert Francis

Keep me from going to sleep too soon
Or if I go to sleep too soon
Come wake me up.
Come any hourOf night.
Come whistling up the road.
Stomp on the porch.
Bang on the door.
Make me get out of bed and come
And let you in and light a light.
Tell me the northern lights are on
And make me look.
Or tell me clouds
Are doing something to the moon
They never did before, and show me.
See that I see.
Talk to me till
I'm half as wide awake as you
And start to dress wondering
whyI ever went to bed at all.
Tell me the walking is superb.
Not only tell me but persuade me.
You know I'm not too hard persuaded.