After repeated readings to growing puplets,
we leave off last words in rhyming…
couplets!
Poetry invites dynamism. Find yourself rhymin’ with ‘em.
Maurice Sendak said, Trap readers inside the rhythm.
Not as many kids’ books rhyme as you might think.
Stories with forced rhymes emit a slight stink!
Here’s my primer for rhyming picture books.
I looked for fixtures
which catch minors like fishers’ hooks.
— MC Paul Barman
Hush! A Thai Lullabye by Minfong Ho, 1995
A Caldecott winner, Hush! is one of the best naptime books, adding flavor to the familiar theme of barn animals.
Hush! Who’s that beeping the pond?
"Ghap-ghap! Ghap-ghap!"
A glossy white duck.
White duck, white duck,
don’t come beeping.
Can’t you see that
Baby’s sleepng?
White duck, white duck,
don’t you cry?,
My baby’s sleeping
right nearby.
This Little Chick by John Lawrence, 2002
Authentic woodcuts illustrate a traditional verse about an adventurous chick.
This little chick from over the way
went to play with the pigs one day.
and what do you think
they heard him say?
Nutshell Library by Maurice Sendak, 1962
Grippable by tiny hands, this timeless box set contains verse books about the alphabet (Alligators All Around), good behavior (Pierre), counting (One Was Johnny) and the months of the year (Chicken Soup with Rice). In 1975, girl group master Carole King transformed the books into the musical TV special "Really Rosie." When will it be released on DVD?
Alligators All Around
K - keeping kangaroos
L - looking like lions
M - making macaroni
N - never napping
Pierre
There once was a boy
named Pierre
who only would say,
"I don’t care!"
Read his story,
my friend,
for you’ll find
at the end
that a suitable
moral lies there…
One Was Johnny
9 was a robber who
took an old shoe
10 was a puzzle
what should Johnny do?
He stood on a chair and said,
"Here’s what I’ll do–
I’ll start to count backwards
and when I am through–
if this house isnt’ empty
I’ll eat all of you!!"
Chicken Soup With Rice
In August
it will be so hot
I will become a cooking pot
cooking soup of course.
Why not?
Cooking once
cooking twice
cooking chicken soup
with rice.
Some Dogs Do by Jez Alborough, 2003
Jez Alborough has one of the catchiest flows in kid-dom. If you like this one, check out his addictive Duck in a Truck series.
All dogs walk and jump and run,
but dogs don’t fly - it can’t be done.
"But I did," said Sid. "I did."
On Beyond Zebra! by Dr. Seuss, 1955
The audacity to create new letters for the English alphabet puts this selection ahead of Seuss’s famousest titles.
I said, "You can stop, if you want, with the Z
because most people stop with the Z. But not me!
I’m telling you this ’cause you’re one of my friends.
My alphabet starts where your alphabet ends!"
Zin! Zin! Zin! a Violin by Lloyd Moss, 1995
This book simultaneously teaches instruments and personnel line-ups, from solo to nonette.
FLUTE, that sends our soul a-shiver;
FLUTE, that slender, silver sliver.
A place among the set it picks
To make a young SEXTET — that’s SIX.
Is Your Mama a Llama? by Deborah Guarino, 1989
Most masterpieces are made by masters, but both Zin Zin Zin and Is Your Mama a Llama? are one-offs — the only picture books written by the authors.
"Is your mama a llama?" I asked my friend Dave.
"No she is not," is the answer Dave gave.
"She hangs by her feet and she lives in a cave.
I do not believe that’s how llamas behave."
"Oh," I said, "You are right about that.
I think your mama sounds more like a…"
Baby Beluga by Raffi, 1990
A beautiful board book illustrating the lyrics to the first song my son learned outside of the "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" somnoverse.
Baby beluga in the deep blue sea.
Swim so wild and swim so free.
Heaven above and the sea below
and a little white whale on the go.
The Charles Addams Mother Goose by Charles Addams, 1967
You already know the nursery rhymes, but trust me: you need this book. Once an expensive collectable, it was reprinted to showcase his take on a stoned sidesaddle Mother Goose riding an irritated goose… the giant spider about to bogart Miss Muffet’s tuffet picnic… the lizard that hatches out broken Humpty Dumpty…
Frederick by Leo Lionni, 1967
Mostly prose, Frederick — a picture book expressing the value of poetry itself — rhymes only at the end.
. . . And as Frederick spoke of the sun
the four little mice
began to feel warmer.
Was it Frederick ’s voice?
Was it magic? . . .
And when he told them
of the blue periwinkles,
the red poppies in the yellow what,
and the green leaves
of the berry bush,
they saw the colors as clearly
as if they had been painted
in their minds.
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