In comments, xanax writes: “My 4-year old daughter is currently working on a poem called The Heart of a Potato.” Since we at ObWi always try to encourage youthful creativity, I have set aside the poem I had thought of posting today — it can wait: there is, after all, a lot of National Poetry Month left to go — and will post the following instead, to encourage her to write many potato poems.
The Potato
The useful and the beautiful
Are not far apart we know.
And thus the beautiful are glad to have,
The homely looking Potato.
On the land, or on the sea,
Wherever we may go,
We are always glad to welcome
The homely Potato.
A practical and moral lesson
This may plainly show,
That though homely, our heart can be
Like that of the homely Potato.
— Eliza Cook
She might also like Brave Potatoes, a truly wonderful kids’ book, which ends (if memory serves) with the following lines:
We will never be Pot Pie
We will never be pot luck
We will never be frittata
We will always be potatoes
Potatoes to the finish
Potatoes to the end
We will always be courageous
We will always be POTATOES!
The Potato of Doom, by Edward Monkton
A thousand times it calls your name
A thousand times you hear it
And fools are those who heed its call
Yet fools are those who fear it
The Heart of a Potato
by Clara
We made heart stamps
out of a potato. One for
Xander and one for me.
Xander’s ink pad was purple.
Mine was purple too.
We stamped purple hearts
on white paper and on our hands.
Xander got two stamps on his belly.
I am four and Xander is two.
A piece of potato fell
on the floor and Xander
stepped on it. Dad said:
Xander!
(Thank you hilzoy and everyone else at Obsidian Wings for your support.)
The Heart of a Potato
by Clara
We made heart stamps
out of a potato. One for
Xander and one for me.
Xander’s ink pad was purple.
Mine was purple too.
We stamped purple hearts
on white paper and on our hands.
Xander got two stamps on his belly.
I am four and Xander is two.
A piece of potato fell
on the floor and Xander
stepped on it. Dad said:
Xander!
(Thank you hilzoy and everyone else at Obsidian Wings for your support.)
Not poetry, but perhaps the root of musings which might lead to a poem:
See Brad Delong’s Semi-Daily Journal, an April 8, 2005 post quoting Adam Smith on many things, including the potato’s utility.
yay clara! It’s always good to have a mini-poet in the house 🙂
In the desert
sat a creature
naked and beastial
who held a potatoe in its hand
and ate of it.
I asked, “Is it good, friend?”
“It’s bitter-bitter
but I like it
because it is bitter and because it is my potatoe.”
)With apologies to Steven Crane)
Well, I’ve got mad database access and didn’t feel like working, so I puttered around on the Literature Online resource for potato poetry. I’m very very sorry to have to report that most twentieth-century poets, according to my very unscientific review of the data, seem to use “potato” as a signifier for “we were common and poor and authentic.” Which makes poetic potato celebration rather more grim than any child need to hear until about 12 or so.
But I found something fun, although it seems like there’s a melody attached to the poem that would make it even more fun.
___________________________________________
Lindsay, Vachel, 1879-1931: THE POTATOES’ DANCE
(A Poem Game) [from Collected poems (1925)]
I
1 “Down cellar,” said the cricket,
2 “Down cellar,” said the cricket,
[Page 127 ]
3 “Down cellar,” said the cricket,
4 “I saw a ball last night,
5 In honor of a lady,
6 In honor of a lady,
7 In honor of a lady,
8 Whose wings were pearly white.
9 The breath of bitter weather,
10 The breath of bitter weather,
11 The breath of bitter weather,
12 Had smashed the cellar pane.
13 We entertained a drift of leaves,
14 We entertained a drift of leaves,
15 We entertained a drift of leaves,
16 And then of snow and rain.
17 But we were dressed for winter,
18 But we were dressed for winter,
19 But we were dressed for winter,
20 And loved to hear it blow
21 In honor of the lady,
22 In honor of the lady,
23 In honor of the lady,
24 Who makes potatoes grow,
25 Our guest the Irish lady,
26 The tiny Irish lady,
27 The airy Irish lady,
28 Who makes potatoes grow.
II
29 “Potatoes were the waiters,
30 Potatoes were the waiters,
31 Potatoes were the waiters,
32 Potatoes were the band,
33 Potatoes were the dancers
[Page 128 ]
34 Kicking up the sand,
35 Kicking up the sand,
36 Kicking up the sand,
37 Potatoes were the dancers
38 Kicking up the sand.
39 Their legs were old burnt matches,
40 Their legs were old burnt matches,
41 Their legs were old burnt matches,
42 Their arms were just the same.
43 They jigged and whirled and scrambled,
44 Jigged and whirled and scrambled,
45 Jigged and whirled and scrambled,
46 In honor of the dame,
47 The noble Irish lady
48 Who makes potatoes dance,
49 The witty Irish lady,
50 The saucy Irish lady,
51 The laughing Irish lady
52 Who makes potatoes prance.
III
53 “There was just one sweet Hitpotato.
54 He was golden brown and slim.
55 The lady loved his dancing,
56 The lady loved his dancing,
57 The lady loved his dancing,
58 She danced all night with him,
59 She danced all night with him.
60 Alas, he wasn’t Irish.
61 So when she flew away,
62 They threw him in the coal-bin,
63 And there he is today,
64 Where they cannot hear his sighs
[Page 129 ]
65 And his weeping for the lady,
66 The glorious Irish lady,
67 The beauteous Irish lady,
68 Who
69 Gives
70 Potatoes
71 Eyes.”
Copyright © 1925 Estate of Vachel Lindsay by Nicholas C. Lindsay, Sr. This text may not be reproduced, except for fair dealing purposes, without the permission of Chadwyck-Healey Inc. and the copyright holder.
_________________________________
I’m, er, reproducing the copyright tag because a) I have no idea what “fair dealing” really means, b) I hope that if I’ve enfringed “fair dealing” that someone legal on ObWi will destroy this post, c) such warnings are always worth documenting and noticing, if only to avoid trouble in the present and humor for the future.
Mad props out to Xanax and Clara for their love of potatoes and internets and for their uncanny ability to synergize the two!
And oh, lord, I couldn’t help myself for clicking a bit further back, and I found this snippet of poetry that probably deserves to be cross-posted at the anti-elitist thread:
MacSweeney, Barry.: In With The Stasi [from The Book of Demons (1997), Bloodaxe Books]
Gnashed fervour licks down like fire
as the diazapam takes over and I lurch worse than drunk
down the locked ward. Barred windows, bedlam,
and all that mashed Hitpotato. I am mashed
also, stale holocaust bread without milk.
_______
This is the first verse paragraph of an almost 50 line poem.
Now, I’m sure this is a Serious Poet–the adjective “holocaust” makes that claim, even if the reader had somehow skipped over the claim to authenticity that “the locked ward” had made. Surely, seriously, there’s a degree of biting nihilism to comparing oneself to mashed potatoes — but it’s not the kind of nihilism that pushes me beyond humor to ironic self-identification. “I am mashed also”??!?
xanax: tell Clara I love her poem — and also that I’m very glad she picked one of the few vegetables I actually know a poem about, even if it’s a pretty dreadful one, unlike hers.
Jackmormon: I love the first, but the second is, as you say, really dreadful. It rivals Eliza Cook’s effort for the Bad Potato Poem Prize. Yikes.
I am going to studiously ignore the knowledge that one can search on ‘poem’ and ‘potato’ and find stuff that way. The possibilities for procrastination are too ghastly.
What an extraordinary community this is! Thank you all for your input and comments. Clara could hardly tear herself from the computer to go to bed tonight she was so enchanted with your feedback. She can’t quite read yet but she does know numbers and each time she’d refresh the page and find a new comment she’d squeal with delight. I mean, Imagine being 4 and having all these adults from all over the world responding to your poem. You’ve helped to teach her many wonderful lessons and I’m grateful to you all… for being so deferential to (and supportive of) my little one. ObWi rocks.
xanax, allow me to recommend a beautiful book about writing poetry when young: The Bat-Poet by Randall Jarrell, with illustrations by Maurice Sendak. It’s aimed at a somewhat older audience than 4, but your daughter sounds precocious enough to appreciate the story if you read it to her. There’s a lot of good stuff about craft in the book, and a lot about the joys and (sometimes) burdens of being a poet. I think it’s a book you’ll enjoy, too.
Clara: I really like “The Heart of a Potato”. You should write more poems. This one is really good.
Bow down!
Bow down!
Before the power of Santa!
Or be crushed,
Be crushed
Byyyyyyyyy
His jolly boots of doom!
– The Most Horrible X-Mas Ever, Invader ZIM
[Yes, it’s technically a song and yes, it’s not much as poetry… but I listened to it half a dozen times last night and I still can’t stop giggling.]
This Is Just To Say
I have eaten
the potato salad
that was in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for dinner.
Forgive me
is was delicious
so lumpy
and with so much sour cream.
— Obviously Not William Carlos Williams
Variations on a Theme by William Carlos Williams
1
I chopped down the house that you had been saving to live in next summer.
I am sorry, but it was morning, and I had nothing to do
and its wooden beams were so inviting.
2
We laughed at the hollyhocks together
and then I sprayed them with lye.
Forgive me. I simply do not know what I am doing.
3
I gave away the money that you had been saving to live on for the next ten years.
The man who asked for it was shabby
and the firm March wind on the porch was so juicy and cold.
4
Last evening we went dancing and I broke your leg.
Forgive me. I was clumsy and
I wanted you here in the wards, where I am the doctor!
— Kenneth Koch
rilkefan: Thanks for the Koch. Best laugh I’ve had in weeks (and The Bat Poet tip).
I think what you are doing is great!!! I want to use your color scheme at my sites…