Children's Poetry by Stephen Richard Eng

8/6/2019 Children's Poetry by Stephen Richard Eng

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Childrens Poetry

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The purple-wanded wizard casts

Enchantment that lastsBeyond your petty life and place:

A spell that spans space.

His work is even guaranteed;

He hasnt got the greed

To spin cheap magic like some do,

So let him serve you.1980

*

All Hallows Eve

Wind in trees,Rain on eaves,

Fire in grate,

Hour is late,

TillfinallyHalloweenShapes are seen!

10-31-71

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All Hallows Eve Epilogue

You say this little book of verse

Is sicker that the rest youve seen?

Remembernothings ever worseThan being born on Halloween.

A poets birthday shouldnt be

A holiday to raise the dead,And yet my anniversary

Is when the greedy ghouls are fed.

01-13-67*

August Storm

Summer thunder shatters sky,

Wet replaces dry,

Unexpected torrents blot


2/10

Out the humid hot.

Is the rain but Natures briefGift for our relief?

Or a random, out-of-place

Waterfall from space?07-10-78

*

Babys Manifesto

Now Im two

And I talk to you;When Im four

Ill talk much more.

03-18-79

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Believe!

Purple cats are back in style,

See them on the street,

Purple whiskers, purple smile,Purple pussy feet.

Little children know theyre there,Only grown-ups dont

Pet the fluffy purple hair,

Never mind who wont.12-02-78

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Beverage (2)

Magical dragons tooth

Brings back youth,Stir in a diamond-clear

Mermaids tear,

Drain the cup just as youre told,Dont grow old.

11-04-77

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Biblio-tourist

Each time I inhale


3/10

The aroma of oranges and tea,

I wish I could sail

The Orient, fickle and free.

The China I seek

Is fashioned of legend and dream.Realitys weak.

But myths ever glimmer and gleam.

I circle the globe,

I think of a pagoda built high,

Where gowned in his robe

Of saffron a monk shuffles by.

For books are bought cheap,

They serve me instead of a ship:

I readfall asleepAnd embark, on a fanciful trip.

11-05-78*

Big Foot

From Canada to California back up in the trees,

Theres a legendary creature no one ever really sees,

Hes a snow-man and an ape-man, and a monster and a myth,But hes no one that a man would ever dare to battle with.

On the southern side of Washington, the spring of Sixty-Nine,Now the weather it was colder, up and down the timberline,

And the monster he was hungry and he left his tracks around,

But nobody ever saw him, for he never made a sound.

And were never going to catch him, for he always disappears,

And the Big Foot, hell keep living for another million years.

Hes the answer and the question; hes the riddle of our time,

But nobody ever shoots him, since it turned into a crime.

And they didnt have to pass a law to save his savage hideFor a man whod hunt the Big Foot would be bound for suicide.

But I still would like to see him, from a mile or so away,With a camera so that I could prove the things I have to say,

But nobodys going to see him in the woods of Washington,

And make the folks believe it, for it never has been done.


4/10

And were never going to catch him, for he always disappears,

And the Big Foot, hell keep living for another million years.

08-12-73*

Cat Query

Why are kitties always shes

Even when theyre hes?Feminine to look at, true,

Still-their sexes number two.

06-03-78

*

Confidential

After Mama is asleepLift the blankets up and peep

At that Purple Cat.Keep it secret what you saw

Purple Cats against the law

(Sos the large Green Rat!)

06-26-78*

December Sky

The moon is misted with rain,

And moon-tears dribble and drainThe length of the sky. They fall

Into the Big Dipper, that catches them each and all.

12-09-78*

Deception

The emerald grass is high,

And silver dewdrops glaze

Beneath the pale gold skyWhere unicorns still graze.

Their horns are ivory,And mythical, its true:

But shut your eyes, and see

Them real as me and you.

1977


5/10

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Difference

Little girls arent little boys,

They dont make noise,Well, not quite as much

When they reach to touch

Delicate new toys.1980

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Dream Album

Ive been a pirate on black seas,

Explorer where the oceans freeze,

A monarch on an opaled throne,An islander with rings of bone

Inside the British Colonies thick sectionOf my boyhood stamp collection.

06-15-78

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Dream Haven

(For L. Sprague de Camp)

Lands unseen are always best

Landscapes in your mind

Blessed Islands gleaming westCartographers cant find.

Terra Incognita liesPast all Southern seas,

Under unknown golden skies

That warms the giant trees.

Animals no man has known

Mammoth fruits and plants,

Palisades of precious stoneThe shoreline of Romance.

05-06-79

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Earth Arson

(for Gabriel Eng)


6/10

The demon sits astride a star

And rides it down the sky.

And from the planet where we areWe wave as he shoots by

Hello, mixed with goodbye.

Is he returning here or not?

Nobody seems to know.

The earth is melting, molten hot,Till flames leap from the glow.

The demons fault, I know!

09-11-78

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Easily Found

Theres a land that is lost, anybody can find:Follow the fairy stream

Through forests of fable, back in your mind,In the countryside full of dream.

Oh, so easy to travel and wander back home,

Over the years once more,Where the elves and trolls are teasing the gnome,

Trying to make him roar.

08-08-73*

Elftune

Ethereal music cheers the night:

Flute and tambourine,Fiddle and a soft guitar,

Musicians never seen.

Fey troubadours stay out of sight,Where the shadows are:

Little men in gold and green

Who sing to moon and star.04-09-80

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Fall Melody

Theres music in the breath of breeze

Exhaling with a wispy wheeze


7/10

That scatters leaves on forest floor

And has one hundred years or more

In singing autumns long before.

A hundred autumns of soft wind,

A hundred times its thinnedThe branches of their leaves, till bare:

A hundred autumn-times the air

And trees have chorused there.10-28-79

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Fall Showers

Summer weeps and grieves,

Rain-tears moisten leaves,

October grey replaces blueAutumn cries, anew.

09-15-78*

Farewell

Rejoice! The cavalcade of dreams arrives,

Fancies, dreads, mirages too,

The legend-laden caravan unpacks for you.

Despair! Processional of dreams departs,

Fairies, ghosts recede from viewParading into mist. Reality obtrudes anew.

1978

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Farewell (2)

A million melting moons dripSilver down the sky,

And spatter lunar madness in your eye.

Your brain becomes a moon-shipVoyaging up high

So wave your Earth-bound sanity goodbye.

06-17-83*

Feeding Time


8/10

Floating on the bay

Of green

Are seenDragon snakes at play.

Arcing through the airThey thrive,

And dive

Down on sailors there.

See them slide and slip

On the deck

Of the wreckThat was once a ship.

02-03-75

*

Fond Fright

Legends live:

Witches give

Wicked, withered looks

From old books.

Fairy rings,

Devil wings;Snuggle down so deep,

Try to sleep.

Demons range

Forth from strange

Empty marble tombsToward your rooms.

Wake, and thrill

Sense the chillWinds that gust your dreams

Wake with screams!

03-07-73*

Gift Wrapped

Christmastime is package-time,

Paper everywhere,

Ribbons, cards, and string, till Im


9/10


10/10

Proud Peter Pan with elfin joy,

Surviving sun and later snow,

A pixie out of long ago.1968

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Industrial Accident

The dragon repair shops closed,The villagers all supposed

The craftsman ran out of scales,

And horns, and thorn-spiked tails.

No, that isnt really why

The craftsman let work slide by.

Hes suffering fire-breath burns:

CLOSED UP, TILL MY HEALTH RETURNS.01-14-79

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Kensington Gardens

The sun in London used to shineAbove the placid Serpentine

Lost summers all too long ago,

And I recall as best I canThe statue of fey Peter Pan

In sunlights glint and glow

(Winters, Peter Pan wore snow.)03-21-80

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Knowledge

Children know so much, today:

Where the fairy folk do play,Where the elves dance in the sun,

Where their inch-high horses run.

12-28-78*

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Children's Poetry by Stephen Richard Eng