Sometimes we experience days when everything seems to go wrong. Bread gets burned in the toaster, a toe gets stubbed on a chair leg, and our mood becomes dark and gloomy. These are days when a little pick-me-up is needed, and one of the best remedies there is for a case of the gloomies is laughter. Today's poetry title is a veritable treasure box of anti-gloomy poems that will make readers feel a little warmer and happier inside.
Laugh-eteria
Laugh-eteria
Douglas Florian
Poetry Book
For ages 6 to 8
Harcourt, 1999, 978-0-15-206148-7
Sometimes people just need something that will make them
smile or laugh. They need to watch that video showing a cat jumping in and out
of a box, or they can pick up a book just like this one. For this title Douglas
Florian has written over a hundred short poems. They have nothing really in
common other than the fact that they are funny and quirky.
In the book you
will encounter a sofa that is unsafe because there is something under it that
has teeth that are green and “gruesome.” This monster, for that is what it
surely is, has eaten the narrator’s homework. And his sisters. Not surprisingly,
the narrator decides that he will “sit on the CHAIR.”
In another poem
we are told what witches wish for. Unlike you or me, they have no interest in
sunny beach vacations, a new cell phone, or a puppy. Dear me no. Witches wish
for things like “Rusty Nails” and “Dragon Tails.” They want horrible weather
and nasty things like vampire blood and poison ivy. What makes this so much
worse is that “Witches always / Get their wishes.”
Witches with
nasty wishes are not the only unpleasant creatures you will encounter in this
book. You will also meet Dracula who drives a “Cadillacula” and likes to “drink
blood for a snackula.” Being attacked by him is terrible of course, but what is
particularly upsetting is that, as he says, “Tomorrow I’ll be backula!”
Throughout this
book the poems are paired with brush and ink drawings that perfectly capture
the flavor of goofiness that infuses the book. For those down-in-the-dump days
(and any other kind of day) this book is a perfect fit.
