Poems from the Book

Upside-Down Jellies

(previously featured on the Home page)

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​An Elephant's Place

Tomorrow when you go to school,
don’t bring your elephant with you.
He’s better off beside the pool
than imitating what you do.
 
For if you take him on the bus,
the kids won’t want to share their seat.
They’ll say, “He leaves no room for us,
and stomps our backpacks with his feet.”
 
In math class he’ll subtract and add,
recite square roots, draw points and planes,
till teacher moans, “I wish I had
a student who had half your brains.”
 
At lunch his trunk will sniff the trays
and grab the foods that please his eye.
Bananas, carrots, apples, grapes
will vanish as he lumbers by.
 
At recess, when he lets your friends
climb on his neck to take a ride,
they’ll squeeze him with their knees and hands
and irritate his thick gray hide.
 
So leave your elephant behind,
to swim and nap and munch on hay.
But go see him at homework time,
and he will help you earn an A.  

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​Valentine's Day   

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Valentine lives in a tank near my bed,
swimming in zigzags, her flesh solid red,
with a white, heart-shaped spot up on her head.
That’s how my fish got her name.
 
Something strange happened today around nine.
Dad installed shelves in the room next to mine,
pounding the walls till my big neon sign
fell off my wall in its frame.
 
Down on the fish tank the heavy sign slid,
cracking the glass and upsetting the lid,
sending them all in an uncontrolled skid,
shattering onto the floor.
 
I was at school when my fish hit the ground.
Dad only heard his own hammering sound.
Six hours later, I walked in and found
glass from the bed to the door.
 

Stepping through puddles, I searched until five,
knowing that Valentine couldn’t survive.
But then I saw her, alert and alive,
in the world’s tiniest lake.
 
One three-edged corner piece, four inches wide,
sat in my closet with water inside,
just deep enough to let Valentine hide
from the results of the quake.
 
We bought a new tank where my fish could stay,
cleaned up the mess, told her now she could play.
She’s swimming fine, and I’m glad she’s okay.
And that was Valentine’s day.

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​© Suzanne Werkema