When We Were Very Young - A. A. Milne [6]
Would you like to try a little
Marmalade
Instead?”
The King said,
“Bother!”
And then he said,
“Oh, dear me!”
The King sobbed, “Oh, deary me!”
And went back to bed.
“Nobody,”
He whimpered,
“Could call me
A fussy man;
I only want
A little bit
Of butter for
My bread!”
The Queen said,
“There, there!”
And went to
The Dairymaid.
The Dairymaid
Said, “There, there!”
And went to the shed.
The cow said,
“There, there!
I didn’t really
Mean it;
Here’s milk for his porringer
And butter for his bread.”
The Queen took
The butter
And brought it to
His Majesty;
The King said,
“Butter, eh?”
And bounced out of bed.
“Nobody,” he said,
As he kissed her
Tenderly,
“Nobody,” he said,
As he slid down
The banisters,
“Nobody,
My darling,
Could call me
A fussy man—
BUT
I do like a little bit of butter to my bread!”
Hoppity
Christopher Robin goes
Hoppity, hoppity,
Hoppity, hoppity, hop.
Whenever I tell him
Politely to stop it, he
Says he can’t possibly stop.
If he stopped hopping,
he couldn’t go anywhere,
Poor little Christopher
Couldn’t go anywhere….
That’s why he always goes
Hoppity, hoppity,
Hoppity,
Hoppity,
Hop.
At Home
I want a soldier
(A soldier in a busby),
I want a soldier to come and play with me.
I’d give him cream-cakes
(Big ones, sugar ones),
I’d give him cream-cakes and cream for his tea.
I want a soldier
(A tall one, a red one),
I want a soldier who plays on the drum.
Daddy’s going to get one
(He’s written to the shopman)
Daddy’s going to get one as soon as he can come.
The Wrong House
I went into a house, and it wasn’t a house,
It has big steps and a great big hall;
But it hasn’t got a garden,
A garden,
A garden,
It isn’t like a house at all.
I went into a house, and it wasn’t a house,
It has a big garden and a great high wall;
But it hasn’t got a may-tree,
A may-tree,
A may-tree,
It isn’t like a house at all.
I went into a house and it wasn’t a house—
Slow white petals from the may-tree fall;
But it hasn’t got a blackbird,
A blackbird,
A blackbird,
It isn’t like a house at all.
I went into a house, and I thought it was a house,
I could hear from the may-tree the blackbird call….
But nobody listened to it,
Nobody
Liked it,
Nobody wanted it at all.
Summer Afternoon
Six brown cows walk down to drink
(All the little fishes blew bubbles at the may-fly).
Splash goes the first as he comes to the brink,
Swish go the tails of the five who follow….
Twelve brown cows bend drinking there
(All the little fishes went waggle-tail, waggle-tail)—
Six from the water and six from the air;
Up and down the river darts a blue-black swallow.
The Dormouse and the Doctor
There once was a Dormouse who lived in a bed
Of delphiniums (blue) and geraniums (red),
And all the day long he’d a wonderful view
Of geraniums (red) and delphiniums (blue).
A Doctor came hurrying round, and he said:
“Tut-tut, I am sorry to find you in bed.
Just say ‘Ninety-nine,’ while I look at your chest….
Don’t you find that chrysanthemums answer the best?”
The Dormouse looked round at the view and replied
(When he’d said “Ninety-nine”) that he’d tried and he’d tried,
And much the most answering things that he knew
Were geraniums (red) and delphiniums (blue).
The Doctor stood frowning and shaking his head,
And he took up his shiny silk hat as he said:
“What the patient requires is a change,” and he went
To see some chrysanthemum people in Kent.
The Dormouse lay there, and he gazed at the view
Of geraniums (red) and delphiniums (blue),
And he knew there was nothing he wanted instead
Of delphiniums (blue) and geraniums (red).
The Doctor came back and, to show what he meant,
He had brought some chrysanthemum cuttings from Kent.
“Now these,” he remarked, “give a much better view
Than geraniums (red) and delphiniums (blue).”
They took out their spades and they dug up the bed
Of delphiniums (blue) and geraniums (red),
And they planted chrysanthemums (yellow and white).