Poems of Childhood

Michael Morpurgo is one of Britain’s best-loved writers for children. He has written over 130 books including War Horse, which was adapted for a hugely successful stage production by the National Theatre and then, in 2011, for a film directed by Steven Spielberg. Michael was Children’s Laureate from 2003 to 2005. The charity Farms for City Children, which he founded thirty years ago with his wife Clare, has now enabled over 70,000 children to spend a week living and working down on the farm. His enormous success has continued with his most recent novels Flamingo Boy and The Snowman, inspired by the classic story by Raymond Briggs. He was knighted in 2018 for services to literature and charity.

• Introduction - i: Introduction Unit - 1: Animals Poem - 1: The Owl and the Pussy-Cat - Edward Lear Poem - 2: The Kitten at Play - William Wordsworth Poem - 3: The Cat and the Moon - W. B. Yeats Poem - 4: Maggie - Anon. Poem - 5: The Duel - Eugene Field Poem - 6: Old Mother Hubbard - Anon Poem - 7: An Alphabet of Questions - Charles Edward Carryl Poem - 8: Measles in the Ark - Susan Coolidge Poem - 9: Old Noah’s Ark - Anon Poem - 10: There Was an Old Lady - Anon Poem - 11: The Lion and the Unicorn - Anon Poem - 12: The Law of the Jungle - Rudyard Kipling Poem - 13: The Tyger - William Blake Poem - 14: On the Grasshopper and Cricket - John Keats Poem - 15: Way Down South - Anon Poem - 16: The Spider and the Fly - Mary Botham Howitt Poem - 17: Against Idleness and Mischief - Isaac Watts Poem - 18: How Doth the Little Crocodile - Lewis Carroll Poem - 19: Hey Diddle Diddle - Anon Poem - 20: Three Blind Mice - Anon Poem - 21: Hickory, Dickory, Dock - Anon Poem - 22: Baa, Baa, Black Sheep - Anon Poem - 23: Mary Had a Little Lamb - Sarah Josepha Hale Poem - 24: The Mouse, the Frog and the Little Red Hen - Anon Poem - 25: A Frog He Would a-Wooing Go - Anon Poem - 26: Five Little Speckled Frogs - Anon Poem - 27: A Song of Toad - Kenneth Grahame Poem - 28: The Shark - Lord Alfred Douglas Poem - 29: The Lobster Quadrille - Lewis Carroll Poem - 30: The Donkey - Anon Poem - 31: The Plaint of the Camel - Charles Edward Carryl Unit - 2: Counting Poem - 1: One, Two, Buckle My Shoe - Anon Poem - 2: One Potato - Anon Poem - 3: Thirty Days Hath September - Anon Poem - 4: Three Little Ghostesses - Anon Poem - 5: One, Two, Three, Four, Five - Anon Unit - 3: Nature Poem - 1: The Months - Sara Coleridge Poem - 2: Child’s Song in Spring - Edith Nesbit Poem - 3: Seven Times One: Exultation - Jean Ingelow Poem - 4: I Saw - Anon Poem - 5: Daffodils - William Wordsworth Poem - 6: Symphony in Yellow - Oscar Wilde Poem - 7: What is Pink? - Christina Rossetti Poem - 8: I Asked the Little Boy Who Cannot See - Anon Poem - 9: Lavender’s Blue - Anon Poem - 10: Little Robin Redbreast - Anon Poem - 11: She Sells Seashells - Anon Poem - 12: I Had a Little Nut Tree - Anon Poem - 13: The Mulberry Bush - Anon Poem - 14: Banyan Tree - Anon Unit - 4: People Poem - 1: Pat- a- cake - Anon Poem - 2: Little Miss Muffet - Anon Poem - 3: Peter Piper - Anon Poem - 4: Simple Simon - Anon Poem - 5: Little Jack Horner - Anon Poem - 6: Little Boy Blue - Anon Poem - 7: Each Peach Pear Plum - Anon Poem - 8: Do You Know the Muffin Man? - Anon Poem - 9: Doctor Foster - Anon Poem - 10: Betty Botter - Anon Poem - 11: Jack and Jill - Anon Poem - 12: Polly and Sukey - Anon Poem - 13: Rosy Apple - Anon Poem - 14: Monday’s Child - Anon Poem - 15: Daisy - Anon Poem - 16: Old King Cole - Anon Poem - 17: Humpty Dumpty - Anon Poem - 18: Soldier, Soldier, Will You Marry Me? - Anon Poem - 19: Bobby Shaftoe - Anon Poem - 20: There Was a Princess Long Ago - Anon Poem - 21: Brown Girl in the Ring - Anon Poem - 22: Waltzing Matilda - Banjo Paterson Poem - 23: The School Boy - William Blake Poem - 24: from The Pied Piper of Hamelin - Robert Browning Poem - 25: La Belle Dame sans Merci - John Keats Poem - 26: Lochinvar - Sir Walter Scott Unit - 5: Nonsense Poem - 1: Jabberwocky - Lewis Carroll Poem - 2: Tweedle- dum and Tweedle- dee - Anon Poem - 3: Beautiful Soup - Lewis Carroll Poem - 4: Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat - Lewis Carroll Poem - 5: You Are Old, Father William - Lewis Carroll Poem - 6: The Mad Gardener’s Song - Lewis Carroll Poem - 7: The Sugar-Plum Tree - Eugene Field Poem - 8: Wynken, Blynken and Nod - Eugene Field Poem - 9: There Was an Old Man with a Beard - Edward Lear Poem - 10: The Man in the Wilderness - Anon Poem - 11: The Jumblies - Edward Lear Poem - 12: The Walrus and the Carpenter - Lewis Carroll Poem - 13: The Pobble Who Has No Toes - Edward Lear Unit - 6: Places Poem - 1: I Remember, I Remember - Thomas Hood Poem - 2: From a Railway Carriage - Robert Louis Stevenson Poem - 3: The Big Ship Sails on the Alley, Alley O - Anon Poem - 4: A Sailor Went to Sea Sea Sea - Anon Poem - 5: Pop Goes the Weasel! - Anon Poem - 6: The Bells of London - Anon Poem - 7: London Bridge Is Falling Down - Anon Unit - 7: Fairies, Mermaids and Witches Poem - 1: Fire, Burn; and Cauldron, Bubble - William Shakespeare Poem - 2: Overheard on a Saltmarsh - Harold Monro Poem - 3: The Mermaid - Alfred, Lord Tennyson Poem - 4: The Merman - Alfred, Lord Tennyson Poem - 5: The Forsaken Merman - Matthew Arnold Unit - 9: Night Poem - 1: Star Light, Star Bright - Anon Poem - 2: Bed-time - Anon Poem - 3: Hush, Little Baby - Anon Poem - 4: Sweet and Low ( from The Princess) - Alfred, Lord Tennyson Poem - 5: The Star - Jane Taylor Poem - 6: A Cradle Song - Thomas Dekker Poem - 7: A Cradle Song - Thomas Dekker Poem - 8: My Shadow - Robert Louis Stevenson Poem - 9: Escape at Bedtime - Robert Louis Stevenson Poem - 10: The Land of Story Books - Robert Louis Stevenson Poem - 11: I Had a Boat - Mary Coleridge Poem - 12: Windy Nights - Robert Louis Stevenson Poem - 13: The Land of Counterpane - Robert Louis Stevenson Poem - 14: Minnie and Winnie - Alfred, Lord Tennyson Poem - 15: Teddy Bear - Anon Poem - 16: I See the Moon - Anon Index - ii: Index of Poets Index - iii: Index of Titles Index - iv: Index of First Lines