No boring poems allowed at school!
- Liza Seele
Vamping up the vuma in kids' poetry:
Poems to read and to perform
Rhymes in every shape and form,
For kids, teachers, schools alike
Who have joined the Mzansi textbook strike:
It’s time to march and then toyi-toyi
For every girl and every boy
Who’s had to sit at school and suffer
One dreary poem after another!
Bring back poems that hit the spot,
Like these from S’African melting pot…
We demand a brand-new rule:
No boring poems allowed at school!
HITTING THE SPOT
Rhymes that resonate with kids and make them belly-laugh and their eyes sparkle need to be about kids’ stuff. Simple. They will run in the opposite direction otherwise. Potjie Pot Poems is filled with rhyming poems all about school antics, fierce teachers, rats, lice, baked beans, grannies on Zoom, grandpas going doolally, crazy mums and dads, tooth mouse dramas, Santa on strike, and, of course, an assortment of belches and blow-offs. In between all of that, there are a few tender poems too. All of them will spark delight in all age groups. That’s called hitting the spot!
“A little magic can take you a long way.” - Roald Dahl
What’s your poem?
Enticing kids with rhyming humour can nudge them to try out their own writing skills, especially if they can write about something funny. The best thing about writing poems is that there is no right or wrong. You can start off with a killer punchline and work backwards, you can Google words that rhyme, you can make it as long as you choose, with whatever rhythm you fancy. Ok, you should probably get your spelling right, but otherwise, anything goes! A poem is something you craft, like a piece of art. Everyone has a poem inside them… what’s yours?
SNEAK PEEKS
LICE ON THE LOOSE
Last week our teachers called it quits
We all went home, how nice!
The school came to a standstill
With a festival of lice…
No-one knows how it all started
Or who brought in the nits,
But pretty soon every head in class
Got a bathtime tea-tree blitz!
Despite the frantic washing
Even shaving of the hair,
The nits kept right on popping
Baby lice out everywhere!
Meanwhile on the WhatsApp groups
The moms were getting mean,
Naming, shaming or spouting cures
Like liquid paraffin!
Naughty boys kept rubbing heads
For a Mite Mardi Gras,
While one girl saw the gap
And sold her lice by the jar…
As the pest parade continued
Teachers gave up in dismay,
While the kids at home all thanked those lice
For the extra holiday!
zoom granny
My granny managed to install
The Zoom app for a video call.
(We are all amazed and impressed
‘Cos techno stuff is not her best).
We gather at the meeting time
Wait ages ‘til she comes online…
At last her face pops up on screen
Not quite the same as it’s always been:
Is this our gran, with jet black hair
Chatting to us in her underwear?
As we say our first hellos
We endure a close-up of her nose,
While she explains things going awry
With a home hair job with cheap box dye.
As Mum asks about her knickers
The screen fizzles and suddenly flickers…
Dad cracks up in that short pause
Then gran’s back on in her purple drawers.
She clearly hasn’t any idea
That we can see as well as hear!
She mutes herself by mistake
Leaves the chat for a quick loo break…
We see her knees and then the floor
The ceiling fan and the toilet door.
All of these are by far
Better than her enormous bra!
I love you granny, I miss you too
But I can’t face any more Zooming with you!