Better Than Starbucks
Poetry and Fiction Journal
. . . if you love diversity and creative writing in any and every form, then you’re in the right place . . .
May 2022
Vol VII No II
Published quarterly:
February, May, August,
and November.
Poetry for Children
with Robert Schechter
The King’s Breakfast
The King’s Breakfast
The King asked
The Queen, and
The Queen asked
The Dairymaid:
“Could we have some butter for
The Royal slice of bread?”
The Queen asked the Dairymaid,
The Dairymaid
Said, “Certainly,
I’ll go and tell the cow
Now
Before she goes to bed.”
The Dairymaid
She curtsied,
And went and told
The Alderney:
“Don't forget the butter for
The Royal slice of bread.”
The Alderney
Said sleepily:
“You’d better tell
His Majesty
That many people nowadays
Like marmalade
Instead.”
The Dairymaid
Said, “Fancy!”
And went to
Her Majesty.
She curtsied to the Queen, and
She turned a little red:
“Excuse me,
Your Majesty,
For taking of
The liberty,
But marmalade is tasty, if
It’s very
Thickly
Spread.”
The Queen said
“Oh!”
And went to
His Majesty,
Talking of the butter for
The royal slice of bread,
“Many people
Think that
Marmalade
Is nicer.
Would you like to try a little
Marmalade
Instead?”
The King said,
“Bother!”
And then he said,
“Oh, deary 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!”
Alan Alexander Milne (1882–1956) was an English author, best known for his books about the teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh and for various poems.
Gray
Gray’s a winding mountain road
that goes to who knows where.
Gray’s a wolf, and gray’s a whale,
and gray’s my grandma’s hair.
Gray’s the promise of a storm —
a cozy-blanket day.
They say it’s dull, but all I see
is beauty in the gray.
Suzy Levinson has written children’s poetry for numerous anthologies and magazines (including Highlights, Ladybug, and Spider). Her debut picture book, Animals In Pants (Cameron Kids/Abrams), is scheduled for spring of 2023. Visit her at suzylevinson.com.
Mining Mars
On the surface of Mars, past its highlands,
in the reaches of deep outer-space,
there’s a three-thousand-meter rock mesa
in the shape of a huge human face.
Far off in the way distant future,
if your mission’s to rocket to Mars,
you will land on the planet to study
the face staring up at the stars.
You’ll scale the steep walls to the jawline
with your rock-sampling pick in your pack.
As clouds settle above the Red Planet,
you’ll hike on with the Earth at your back.
You’ll make your way up to the nostrils,
gather specimens that you’ll expose.
As you dig, you’ll be glad no one’s watching
when you’re picking another guy’s nose.
First published in Touchdown.
Helen Kemp Zax is the co-winner of the 2021 YorkMix International Prize for children’s poetry and the 2018 First Prize winner of the middle grade Katherine Paterson Prize. Her poetry appears in Cricket, High Five, and The Caterpillar.
The Things I Saw
a roundel
The things I saw when I was lost
and followed signs for “Devil’s Claw.”
I took that road at such a cost —
the things I saw!
Through forest trees I peered in awe
at witches standing in the frost,
who handled things, an ear, a paw,
then quickly, in their cauldron tossed,
these objects with a birdy’s craw.
I turn and fled, my eyes had crossed —
the things I saw!
First published in Underneath the Juniper Tree.
B. J. Lee is a children’s author and poet. Her picture book, There Was An Old Gator Who Swallowed A Moth, launched in 2019 (Pelican Publishing). Her poetry is published by Little, Brown, National Geographic, Bloomsbury, Penguin/DK, Eerdmans, Wordsong, and Otter-Barry.
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