It's Poetry Month! - View from the Front Porch

It’s Poetry Month!

April is National Poetry Month. Poets.org has provided opportunities and activities to celebrate poetry and poets.

One of my favorite poems is about a realio, trulio, little pet dragon named Custard by Ogden Nash. I read the poem to my children, greats, and grands so often most of them memorized it.

“The Tale of Custard the Dragon”

Belinda lived in a little white house,
With a little black kitten and a little gray mouse,
And a little yellow dog and a little red wagon,
And a realio, trulio, little pet dragon.

Now the name of the little black kitten was Ink,
And the little gray mouse, she called her Blink,
And the little yellow dog was sharp as Mustard,
But the dragon was a coward, and she called him Custard.

Custard the dragon had big sharp teeth,
And spikes on top of him and scales underneath,
Mouth like a fireplace, chimney for a nose,
And realio, trulio daggers on his toes.

Belinda was as brave as a barrel full of bears,
And Ink and Blink chased lions down the stairs,
Mustard was as brave as a tiger in a rage,
But Custard cried for a nice safe cage.

Belinda tickled him, she tickled him unmerciful,
Ink, Blink and Mustard, they rudely called him Percival,
They all sat laughing in the little red wagon
At the realio, trulio, cowardly dragon.

Belinda giggled till she shook the house,
and Blink said Weeck! which is giggling for a mouse,
Ink and Mustard rudely asked his age,
When Custard cried for a nice safe cage.

Suddenly, suddenly they heard a nasty sound,
And Mustard growled, and they all looked around.
Meowch! cried Ink, and Ooh! cried Belinda,
For there was a pirate, climbing in the winda.

You can read the rest of the poem here: https://internetpoem.com/ogden-nash/the-tale-of-custard-the-dragon-poem/

I do love Ogden Nash. Reviewers of his work often criticized him for taking liberties with spelling and rhyme.

Liberties that I find delightful because I have this habit of adding syllables and phrases to words and names too. Grandchildren became Brook E, Abby-Me-Gail, Faith-e-foo, Morg-from-org, and Rachel-Roo. Children: J.Beetle, Sa-RA, Stefoney, etc. It always brought a smile to their faces until they hit their teen years.

I love the Custard dragon poem so much when I saw this dragon welded from spare farm parts at a craft fair, I had to add him to the guard the patio.