A jungle of poems
Shalini Rawat

The Puffin Book of Poetry for Children: 101 Poems
eds. Eunice de Souza and Melanie Silgardo. Penguin Books India. Pages 103. Rs 175.

Hark, the Night Mail!

Tenuous and Precarious

Slowly chugs down the slope,

carrying a Cat (out of the Rat Race)

The Tyger (revisited), A Dove

and A Baby Antelope

 

Into the jungle of poems

Where The Hopping Frog

wants to Be Like the Bird

Pahari Parrots pull The Pulley and

A Lizard by The Cyber River

is a veritable nerd

 

Where the Mind is Without Fear and

The Three Ravens sit

in Solitude on the Kiph

telling Moral Tales for the Young

on A Hot Day

but for Kipling’s If-

 

where The Devil says A Prayer

on All Soul’s Night

To My Brother you see

who’s The Soldier fighting

A Kind of War on

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

 

there’s even A Small Poem for My Father

Dear Mum and For a Five Years Old

wholesome poems for all to savour

just like the Ice Golawallah sold

 

and Akhond of Swat, sir, I’m sure

An Injection in The Boy’s Head

of this volume rich

would certainly cure

the longing for good poetry

and the Jabberwocky of The Itch!

(The words in italics are the titles of the poems included in this collection. Don’t get deceived by the title of the book, the poems make for delightful reading for people of all ages.)

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