THE GIVING TREE BY SHEL SILVERSTEIN

SPOON FEEDING BY W.R.INGE

SPOON FEEDING BY W.R.INGE

Disclaiming against the tendency of modern living conditions to “spoon-feed” the individual, the Very Rev. W. R. Inge, London’s “Gloomy Dean” who is presently upon a lecture tour of the United States, comes to the conclusion, in the course of an article in The Living Age, that nature will make us pay for our easy mode of life, to day. Nature, he argues, will take away any faculty that is not used. 

He cites the savage “who never had any trouble with his teeth,” as against the individual of to day. The savage kept “healthy by the hard work in tearing tough meat without the help of knife and fork.” These implements, he contends, and the art of cookery are reducing man to a toothless animal and are perhaps responsible for such evils as appendicitis and cancer, from which savages hardly suffer at all...............

EQUIPMENT BY EDGAR ALBERT GUEST

EQUIPMENT BY EDGAR ALBERT GUEST

Figure it out for yourself, my lad,

You've all that the greatest of men have had,

Two arms, two hands, two legs, two eyes,

And a brain to use if you would be wise.

With this equipment they all began,

So start for the top and say 'I can.'

Look them over, the wise and great,

They take their food from a common plate

And similar knives and forks they use,

With similar laces they tie their shoes,

The world considers them brave and smart.

But you've all they had when they made their start.

You can triumph and come to skill,

You can be great if only you will,

You're well equipped for what fight you choose,

You have legs and arms and a brain to use,

And the man who has risen, great deeds to do

Began his life with no more than you.

You are the handicap you must face,

You are the one who must choose your place,

You must say where you want to go.

How much you will study the truth to know,

God has equipped you for life, But He

Lets you decide what you want to be.

Courage must come from the soul within,

The man must furnish the will to win,

So figure it out for yourself, my lad,

You were born with all that the great have had,

With your equipment they all began.

Get hold of yourself, and say: 'I can.'

HUMAN FAMILY BY DR. MAYA ANGELOU

HUMAN FAMILY (POEM BY DR. MAYA ANGELOU) 

I note the obvious differences 

in the human family. 

Some of us are serious, 

some thrive on comedy. 

Some declare their lives are lived 

as true profundity, 

and others claim they really live 

the real reality. 

The variety of our skin tones 

can confuse, bemuse, delight, 

brown and pink and beige and purple, 

tan and blue and white. 

I’ve sailed upon the seven seas 

and stopped in every land. 

I’ve seen the wonders of the world, 

not yet one common man. 

I know ten thousand women 

called Jane and Mary Jane, 

but I’ve not seen any two 

who really were the same. 

Mirror twins are different 

although their features jibe, 

and lovers think quite different thoughts 

while lying side by side. 

We love and lose in China, 

we weep on England’s moors, 

and laugh and moan in Guinea, 

and thrive on Spanish shores. 

We seek success in Finland, 

are born and die in Maine. 

In minor ways we differ, 

in major we’re the same. 

I note the obvious differences 

between each sort and type, 

but we are more alike, my friends 

than we are unalike. 

We are more alike, my friends, 

than we are unalike. 

We are more alike, my friends, 

than we are unalike.

THE KITE BY HARRY BEHN

THE KITE BY HARRY BEHN 

(All of us like to fly kites. Have you ever tried to fly one? Read this poem about a kite as it flies in the sky.)

How bright on the blue 

Is a kite when it’s new! 

With a dive and a dip 

It snaps its tail 

Then soars like a ship 

With only a sail 

As over tides 

Of wind it rides, 

Climbs to the crest 

Of a gust and pulls, 

Then seems to rest 

As wind falls. 

When string goes slack 

You wind it back 

And run until 

A new breeze blows 

And its wings fill 

And up it goes! 

How bright on the blue 

Is a kite when it’s new! 

But a raggeder thing 

You never will see 

When it flaps on a string 

In the top of a tree.

HARVEST HYMN BY JOHN BETJEMAN

Harvest Hymn by John Betjeman 

Getting Started 

List the things that we get from Nature. What do we give in return? 

What is likely to happen if there is no land to cultivate in the future? 

We spray the fields and scatter 

The poison on the ground 

So that no wicked wild flowers 

Upon our farm be found. 

We like whatever helps us 

To line our purse with pence; 

The twenty-four-hour broiler-house 

And neat electric fence. 

All concrete sheds around us 

And Jaguars in the yard, 

The telly lounge and deep-freeze 

Are ours from working hard. 

We fire the fields for harvest, 

The hedges swell the flame, 

The oak trees and the cottages 

From which our fathers came. 

We give no compensation, 

The earth is ours today, 

And if we lose on arable, 

The bungalows will pay.