By Charlotte Headrick (2019) and Ogden Nash (1950)
Introduction
By Ogden Nash
Camille Saint-Saëns was wracked with pains
When people addressed him as “Saint Sains.”
He held the human race to blame
Because it could not pronounce his name.
So he turned with metronome and fife
To glorify other forms of life.
Be quiet, please, for here begins
His salute to feathers, furs, and fins.
Royal March of the Lion
By Ogden Nash
The lion is the king of beasts
And husband of the lioness.
Gazelles and things on which he feasts
Address him as Your Highoness.
There are those who admire that roar of his
In the African jungles and veldts,
But I think, wherever a lion is,
I’d rather be somewhere else.
Duck
By Charlotte Headrick
Not a swan, nor a grey goose, this is a duck.
Not a beaver, nor a turkey, full of luck.
With a waddle on the ground,
And a quack on the water,
The duck goes round and round.
Cheetah
By Charlotte Headrick
Flash! Did you see her?
Flash! Did you see her? Flash!
This is the cheetah, fastest on the earth
If you are in her way, all will go smash
But as she runs, she is full of mirth
Sleek as silk, full of grace
Huntress she is, with a smile on her face.
Tortoises
By Ogden Nash
Come crown my brow with leaves of myrtle,
I know the tortoise is a turtle.
Come carve my name in stone immortal,
I know the tortoise is a tortle.
I know to my profound despair
I bet on one to beat a hare.
I also know I’m now a pauper
Because of its tortley, turtle, torpor.
The Elephant
By Ogden Nash
Elephants are useful friends,
Equipped with handles at both ends.
They have a wrinkled moth-proof hide;
Their teeth are upside down, outside.
If you think the elephant preposterous,
You’ve probably never seen a rhinosterous.
Cat
By Charlotte Headrick
Oh, the cat moves through the night,
Graceful, she is at first sight,
But we must take exquisite care
She hides her claws on a dare
She cuddles, she hisses,
She covers you with kisses,
Take care, her teeth are sharp, and she may bite!
The Aquarium
By Ogden Nash
Some fish are minnows,
Some are whales,
People like dimples,
Fish like scales.
Some fish are slim,
And some are round.
They don’t get cold,
They don’t get drowned.
But every fish wife
Fears for her fish.
What we call mermaids
And they call merfish.
Ballet Teachers
(Personages with long ears and big eyes)
By Charlotte Headrick
And all the ballet teachers watch and pout
Loudly chanting, “Turnout, turnout, turnout!”
As they watch with big eyes, checking those steps,
Counting as they do those repeated reps.
Yes, Tour jeté, tour jeté, tour jeté,
Carriage, port de bras, where do those arms lay?
Listening with long ears for mute landings,
And this they study among other things:
Repétition, repétition, repétition,
They closely watch bunheads soon to be gone.
Wolf & Cuckoo in the Woods
By Charlotte Headrick
The wolf, who mates for life,
Not like the cuckoo’s fickle style
But the cuckoo doesn’t care,
Running circles in the wolf’s hair
Round and round the cuckoo flies,
And the wolf is filled with huge sighs.
The Birds
By Ogden Nash
Puccini was Latin, and Wagner Teutonic,
And birds are incurably philharmonic.
Suburban yards and rural vistas
Are filled with avian Andrews Sisters.
The skylark sings a roundelay,
The crow sings “The Road to Mandalay.”
The nightingale sings a lullaby,
And the seagull sings a gullaby.
That’s what shepherds listened to in Arcadia
Before somebody invented the radia.
Ballet Students
By Charlotte Headrick
See the ballet students, all in a row,
Pirouette, arabesque, ronds de jambe, go!
Cambré, battement, first position, plié,
Ballet students, run, run, run, leap, and stay,
All the lovely ones gliding on the stage
All together, rhythmic, not on some page
Jeté, tendu, allegro, assemblé
Cabriole, changé, chassé, balancé
See the ballet students; this is their day.
Ballet Fossils
By Charlotte Headrick
Marius Petipa, a genius man
Swan Lake, La Bayadere were his great plan
Are they ballet fossils?, holding the stage
Classics but often reworked from the page
The “Shades” in their long lines dance their old way
More memorable the critics say
Nijinsky, Nureyev, Barishnikov
All great dancers but those “shades” still lead off
The Swan
By Ogden Nash
The swan can swim while sitting down.
For pure conceit he takes the crown.
He looks in the mirror over and over,
And claims to have never heard of Pavlova.
Finale
By Ogden Nash
Now we reach the grand finale,
Animale, carnival.
Noises new to sea and land
Issue from the skillful band.
All the strings contort their features,
Imitating crawly creatures.
All the brasses look like mumps
From blowing umpah umpah umps.
In outdoing Barnum and Bailey and Ringling,
Saint-Saëns has done a miraculous thingling
