Exploring Themes in Poetry

I cooked my math book in a broth and stirred it to a steaming froth. I threw in papers—pencils, too— to make a pot of homework stew.

I turned the flame up nice and hot and tossed my binder in the pot. I sprinkled in my book report with colored markers by the quart.

Despite its putrid, noxious gas, I proudly took my stew to class. And though the smell was so grotesque, I set it on my teacher’s desk.

My teacher said, “You’re quite a chef. But, still, you’re going to get an F. I didn’t ask for ‘homework stew,’ I said, ‘Tomorrow, homework’s due.’”

“I cannot go to school today,” Said little Peggy Ann McKay. “I have the measles and the mumps, A gash, a rash and purple bumps. My mouth is wet, my throat is dry, I’m going blind in my right eye. My tonsils are as big as rocks, I’ve counted sixteen chicken pox And there’s one more—that’s seventeen, And don’t you think my face looks green? My leg is cut—my eyes are blue— It might be instamatic flu. I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke, I’m sure that my left leg is broke— My hip hurts when I move my chin, My belly button’s caving in, My back is wrenched, my ankle’s sprained, My ‘pendix pains each time it rains. My nose is cold, my toes are numb. I have a sliver in my thumb. My neck is stiff, my voice is weak, I hardly whisper when I speak. My tongue is filling up my mouth, I think my hair is falling out. My elbow’s bent, my spine ain’t straight, My temperature is one-o-eight. My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear, There is a hole inside my ear. I have a hangnail, and my heart is—what? What’s that? What’s that you say? You say today is…Saturday? G’bye, I’m going out to play!”