The Poetry of Wayne Edwards
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I think that young kids will see the humor in “Spot Dog.” The whole story is clearly ridiculous, including the making of a spot out of Spot Dog.
Did you ever dream of having an elephant for a pet when you were a kid? A lot of children’s poems are about ridiculous situations. Everybody writes about dinosaurs, I happen to like elephants. They are hard to hide from your parents and are probably hard to housebreak.
The Poetry of Wayne Edwards
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No-School Land
Last week I went to No-School Land.
I thought that I would love it there
Because they don’t have books to study
And not one rule on what to wear.
The land there is one long recess
And full of other kids like me,
Except that no one there can read
Or even count as high as three.
There are no games, like Hide-And-Seek,
No matter how much they all tried,
‘Cause when no one can count past two
It seems no one has time to hide.
No one can buy ice cream or toys
‘Cause no one there knows how to count.
No one can give you the right change
‘Cause they can’t figure the amount.
There are no bedtime stories read
And not a single clock to chime.
No one knows when it’s time for lunch
‘Cause no one there can tell the time.
No video games or comic books,
Life there is not much of a grin,
So I don’t think I’ll ever go
To visit No-School Land again.
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Preschool
When you left me off at preschool,
It was good you’d named me Tommy.
Because Tommy’s what the teacher
And the other kids all called me.
Sister gave me some good advice:
She said,”Don’t learn how to spell cat.
Or you’ll get lots more words to spell
And they’ll get harder after that”.
Teacher taught us, that we should share,
And give back the things we borrow.
I guess I didn’t learn enough.
Cause she said, “See you tomorrow”.
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The School Mascot
“The school mascot, Old Bill, the goat,
Has to find a new place to live.”
The coach informed the football team,
“Because his shed leaks like a sieve.”
One of the players told the coach
That they could keep him in their dorm.
They could feed him from the chow hall
And they could keep him dry and warm.
The coach said, “That would never work,
The smell wouldn’t let you do it.”
“Oh, come on Coach.” one player said.
“That old goat will get used to it?”
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Goodbye Dolly
He’s been my little baby doll
Since the birthday that I turned two.
Back then he had all of his hair;
I hugged him and I named him Sue.
Tonight, before I went to bed,
I threw my little doll away.
I threw him in the garbage pail
And told him he would have to stay.
Listen, did you hear him whimper
Or was that me that I heard cry
When I knelt there beside the pail
So I could say my last goodbye?
Mother said I should be brave
But Dad just sadly shook his head.
Mom always kisses me goodnight
And Daddy tucks me into bed.
Tonight he whispered in my ear,
That he was proud as he could be,
And maybe now my college friends
Would all stop making fun of me!
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The Marriage Counselor’s Advice
They told the marriage counselor
All of their irks and all their woes woes.
How they’d stayed this long together
I don’t think anybody knows.
Then the counselor grabbed the wife
He held her tight and then he kissed her;
A very long and passionate kiss,
Not the kind he’d give his sister!
Then he told the startled husband
“I’ve demonstrated what wives seek,
Your marriage can be easily fixed,
If she gets this three times a week.”
The husband said, “Doc I’m willing
I’ll do anything that you say.
I’ll bring her by three times a week
Any particular time of day?”
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Marriage Counselor
The marriage counselor said to us
“You should go out two nights a week;
Romantic meals by candlelight
Would bring the happiness you seek.”
So we tried it, it really works!
We no longer have those bad fights.
My wife likes Wednesday nights the best,
So I go out on Friday nights.
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Marriage License
The marriage license fella was nice
But he didn’t know a lot.
Me and Mary Jo wanted a license
But this paper’s all we got.
He said it was good for thirty days
Which I think’s a little queer.
Even the license on my pickup truck
Is is good for one whole year.
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Separate Bedrooms
My wife claims that my snoring,
At night keeps her awake
She asked for separate bedrooms
For our happy marriage’s sake.
I asked which rooms she had in mind,
Her answer was quite plain.
She wants to keep hers where it is,
For mine she recommended Spain!
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Rice
They had been going together
For what it seemed to her like years.
That he’d never mentioned marriage,
Had caused her much remorse and tears.
He was ordering Chinese take out.
He asked how she’d like her rice;
Did she want it steamed or fried?
She answered, “Thrown would sure be nice!”
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Old Maid
Henry kissed me long ago,
Longer than you need to know.
Memories of that day gone by,
One last wish before I die.
When carving letters on my stone,
Don’t put, “She lies here all alone.”
Don’t put, “Love and marriage missed her.”
For my epitaph just put,
“HENRY KISSED HER!”
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Consider the Tumble Bug
He follows a cow
Until nature calls
Then rolls up her droppings
In neat little balls.
Did the other bugs think
His parents were crude
When they taught the young beetle
To play with his food?
I’ll be first to admit
That his sculptures are neat
But I will look elsewhere
For something to eat.
We can learn from the beetle
When life’s droppings fall
Just roll them all up
In a neat little ball.
Dig a deep hole
In which it will fit
Then bury the ball
And forget about it.
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Consider the Giraffe
The giraffe walks around all day,
His head up in a cloud.
He never says a word,
Well, at least not one out loud.
From way up there on high,
He can see all of the sights.
You have to pity a giraffe
Who’s deathly scared of heights.
He has two little knobby horns;
Though I’ve not heard it said,
I think that they were put up there
So he won’t bump his head.
He has some very sharp toenails
That he could use for wrecking,
But he’s no fighter, he’s a lover;
I bet he’s good at necking.
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Consider the Snake
“Consider the Snake” is a humorous poem, but have you ever considered the fact that, in the creation story, the serpent lost his legs for being out of sorts with his Creator? It wasn’t a small thing that the serpent did. He acted as an agent for the devil to destroy God’s perfect plan of creation. Eventually this act caused God to sacrifice His only Son.
Up until that time, the serpent must have been well liked. He ran around with Eve and they must have been friends or why would she have trusted him so? He was the only animal, mentioned in the story, that had the gift of speech. When he lost his legs, he lost that ability also.
Today we have just as much to lose when we interfere with God’s plan of salvation as the serpent did. What’s more, we are influenced by the same presence as influenced Eve.
Let’s give a thought, if you have time,
To treatment of the lowly snake.
Who without benefit of legs
Must travel over land and lake.
He lost his legs, the Good Book says,
Because he tempted Adam’s wife
And brought the first recorded fight
Into that happy couple’s life.
She’ll crush his head, the curse of God
It says, beneath her very heel.
Nor was he given equal space
To tell how low it made him feel.
He says he had a good excuse
If we’d only listen to it;
He says that it was genetic
And the devil made him do it.
So the snake, down through the ages,
I think received his just dessert.
When he travels on his stomach,
That hot sand has got to hurt.
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Consider the Tortoise
He takes long walks
Alone in the park
But he never fails
To get home before dark.
‘Cause he takes his home
Wherever he goes
He drags it along
With the claws on his toes.
He’s famous with children
For winning one race
Which taught the advantage
Of a good steady pace.
Though safe in his shell
When danger’s about,
He can only make progress
When his neck’s sticking out.
He has a strict rule
Be you close friend or kin,
You can visit his house
But you just can’t come in.
And still you will find him
A most generous soul,
If you have him for soup
He’ll furnish the bowl.
Consider the Toad
Let’s consider the toad,
Who’s a creature of myth.
He looks much like a frog
Whom he’s close kinfolks with.
He’s accused unjustly
As the source of our warts;
Being used by witches
To make brews of all sorts.
He’s no match for a tire,
Our brown hoppity-toad,
Who oft leaves the outline
Of himself in the road.
Now to pick up a toad’s
Not the smart thing to do.
He drinks water all day
Just to piddle on you!
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Raining Cats and Dogs
A rainy day, his mood was dark
And now a cat stuck in his tree.
A spindly tree, one could not climb,
A plan devised to set it free.
He threw a rope up near the cat,
It snagged a limb, all well so far.
The other end he tied, real tight,
Onto the bumper of his car.
He pulled the tree down to a height
That he could almost reach the cat.
Just then the wet rope came untied,
He certainly hadn’t planned on that.
The catapult was aptly named,
He watched the creature fly away.
He wondered where the cat might land.
It hadn’t been his kind of day.
Two blocks away a startled boy
Was knocked flat on his bedroom floor.
He saw an angry ball of fur
Run quickly out the open door.
“Shut your window,” his mother called,
“It’s raining cats and dogs again.”
“It’s too late,” yelled the little boy,
I think a cat just got rained in.
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Alphabet Soup
Mom gave me a bowl of soup
That had a bunch of letters.
So I spelled out FRENCH POODLES
And then spelled IRISH SETTERS.
Next I spelled FINNISH LAPHOUND,
Then even though it was hard,
Spelled MEXICAN CHIHUAHUA
And then I spelled SAINT BERNARD.
But when I spelled out HOUSE CAT
The dogs all tried to get her.
She jumped out of my soup bowl,
Chased by a ROSMORE SETTER!
Soup spilled all over the floor
And made a terrible mess.
It splattered all down the front
Of Aunt Lilly’s Sunday dress.
Well Mama’s quite unhappy
And Aunt Lilly’s kind of sore.
It seems to me that no one
Believes the truth any more!
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And Her Cat Too
Sister’s cat is a real ratfink
No matter what she tries to say,
‘Cause when I make a small mistake
The stupid cat gives me away.
When I broke Dad’s model airplane
And tried to claim that it was her,
She ran and jumped up in Dad’s lap
And won him over with a purr.
Dad said eggs make cats’ fur shiny.
So why waste a good rotten egg?
The stupid cat ran in the house
And rubbed it off on Mama’s leg.
I want to warn you so you’ll know,
My little sister is a brat;
But I will give her to you free
If you will also take her cat.
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During the school year there is no greater pleasure than sleeping late on a Saturday morning. One of my mother’s standard comments was, “I thought maybe you had planned to hibernate.” I knew from reading animal books just which animals hibernated, and I would make believe that I was snuggled up next to a big grizzly bear in its den. It doesn’t seem like such a great idea now, as I look back on childhood days, even though it was just a Teddy bear.
The little boy in No Vacancy is irritated at his guests, but he is a little hesitant about telling the bear. My mother encouraged my imagination; maybe that’s why I write the kinds of poems that I do today.
One of the greatest gifts of childhood is imagination. The worst enemy of imagination is ridicule.
No Vacancy
Sometimes on Saturday morning,
When I’m trying to sleep in late,
My mom likes to laugh and ask me,
“Are you going to hibernate?”
Some how the word has gotten out
That I have a really neat place.
‘Cause when I woke-up this morning
A skunk was curled up in my face.
A squirrel was hiding winter nuts
In a nest he’d made at my feet.
And a porcupine was snuggled
Against the mound made by my seat.
I guess my bed is pretty big,
And I was always taught to share,
But now I’m running out of room
And I’m afraid to tell the bear.
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Spot Dog
Last night when I called Spot Dog,
An elephant came instead.
And when it got dark outside,
He curled up in Spot Dog’s bed.
I sure do like elephants;
I think that they’re kinda neat.
But they squash things they step on
With their great big ugly feet.
Today I found my puppy,
I have missed him quite a lot.
He’s always been my Spot Dog,
But now he’s just a Spot!
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Consider the Elephant
Consider the elephant,
Who goes through his day,
Stepping on things
That get in his way.
His body’s so big,
That he can’t even jump,
His nose is a vacuum
But it’s sometimes a pump.
We all use our noses
To breathe, smell, and sneeze.
Elephants can use theirs
To pull up big trees.
An elephant, it’s said,
Very seldom forgets.
Is that a big deal?
Without income or debts,
No meetings or birthdays
For him to remember.
No reason to care if
It’s June or November.
Are elephants so smart?
We may just never know.
But you’ll know for sure
If one steps on your toe!
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Why the Elephant Painted Its Toenails Red
I asked the little elephant,
“Why are your toenails red?”
“It’s really very simple,”
Is what I think he said.
It seems the little elephant
Was playing hide-and-seek,
With all the other animals
In our back yard last week.
Elephants are kind of big,
It’s hard to hide, you see.
He painted all his toenails red
And hid up in our cherry tree.
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Dad’s Cool is not always the case; sometimes it’s Mom who’s cool. Our family’s last move, while still in the Air Force, was to Albuquerque, New Mexico. We bought a new house that wasn’t quite completed, in a neighborhood of vacant lots and houses under construction. I visited the house several times to observe the carpenters at work and noticed a large mongrel hanging around, with whom they were sharing their lunch scraps.
After they had finished their work and gone on to some other job location, I had the task of running the dog off (which was not easy). We moved in a week later and my oldest son, Ron, set out to explore the neighborhood. Guess who followed him home.
With Mom’s help in persuading me, Prince became a part of the family. He lived in our large fenced in back yard and took great delight in tromping through my newly started garden and flowerbeds. An elephant couldn’t have been more efficient at plant destruction. I don’t think that I would have been so quick to give in to an elephant though.
Dad’s Cool
As I was dropping peanuts
Along the path one day,
I noticed that an elephant
Had turned to come my way.
He came into my yard
And followed me inside;
That’s when I found that elephants
Are kind of hard to hide.
Momma hit the ceiling,
I thought that she would croak,
But Dad just smiled and said,
“I hope that thing’s house broke!”
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Elephant Hunter
My daddy hunted little ducks
I’d like to hunt much bigger game
‘Cause hunting little helpless ducks
I think is really kind of lame.
I’m told when hunting elephants
You have to use some sneaky ploys.
The first thing that I’d like to know
Is how to carry my decoys!