pieces of linda

Michael Hague is a renowned children’s book illustrator who just happens to live in Colorado. You may recognize his name or art from books such as The Velveteen Rabbit, The Children’s Book of Virtues, or The Teddy Bear’s Picnic. He is an obvious believer in the value of dreams, not taking oneself too seriously, and the importance of poetry. I had the pleasure of meeting him last year at an Imagination Celebration event (he designs and illustrates their posters yearly). I purchased The Book of Fairy Poetry and was pleased to get his autograph. What really amazed me, though, was how much time he took to delicately draw my own personal fairy inside the cover. How lucky am I?

So, today’s post is in an artist’s honor—fairy poetry to lighten your reality load for the day. Enjoy!

THE SECOND-HAND SHOP
Rowena Bennett

Down in the grasses
Where the grasshoppers hop
And the katydids quarrel
And the flutter-moths flop—
Down in the grasses
Where the beetles go “plop,”
An old withered fairy
Keeps a second-hand shop.

She sells lost thimbles
For fairy milk pails
And burnt-out matches
For fence posts and rails.
She sells stray marbles
To bowl on the green,
And bright scattered beads
For the crown of the queen.

Oh, don’t feel badly
Over things that you lose
Like spin tops and whistles
Or doll’s buckled shoes;
They may be the things that
Fairy folks can use,
For down in the grasses
Where the grasshoppers hop
A withered old fairy
Keeps a second-hand shop.