Author: Kenn Nesbitt

Sometimes I think of the ending of a poem before I know how it’s going to start. An idea for a good ending can come from anywhere, and sometimes it can even come from a poem someone else wrote. That’s the case with this poem.

The poet Joshual Seigal recently wrote a poem called “Motor Skills.” I loved the ending so much, that I wanted to see if I could write something similar. While his poem and mine are completely different, if you read both of them, you should see how the ending of his poem provided the inspiration for mine.

Also, since this is a poem about shapes, I thought I could also make it a learning experience by including as many common shapes as possible. While everyone knows what a circle and a triangle are, you might not remember what a rhombus or a trapezoid look like. So why not take a moment to refresh your memory.

Triangles Make Me Feel Nervous

Triangles make me feel nervous,
and rectangles make me feel sad.
I’m not at all fond of the rhombus,
and octagons drive me quite mad.

The crescent and heart aren’t my favorites.
The trapezoid’s truly bizarre.
The sphere and the circle are silly.
I’m not a big fan of the star.

Of all of the shapes I can think of,
the square is the best one I’ve found.
I’m always excited to see one.
I like when a square is around.

— Kenn Nesbitt

When I was in elementary school, beginning in about the fourth grade, I was responsible for packing my own lunch every day. I even wrote a poem about it in my book Revenge of the Lunch Ladies called “I’m Getting Sick of Peanut Butter.” In that poem, I complain that my lunch has a peanut butter sandwich in it every day, and I’m getting tired of it. The original ending of that poem was, “You see, it is the only thing that I know how to make.” In other words, I had only myself to blame for the fact that my lunch was always the same thing.

When I submitted the poem to my editor, he argued that children don’t pack their own lunches, and insisted that I change the ending, so it would up as, “You see, it is the only thing my mom knows how to make.” I didn’t like that ending as much, but I could see that we were never going to agree, so I decided to compromise.

Recently, I was thinking about that, and it occurred to me that, even if most kids don’t pack their own lunches every day, they might do it every once in a while. I wondered what would happen if a kid who didn’t normally pack their own lunch suddenly had the opportunity. What might they include? Would they put in every sweet or tasty thing they could find? And that’s how this poem was born.

Today I Packed My Lunch Myself

Today I packed my lunch myself.
I got my lunch box off the shelf
and quickly filled it to the top.
I don’t know why I couldn’t stop.
That’s why I have a soda pop,
an ice cream cone, a lemon drop,
bananas, bacon, gummy bears,
lasagna, licorice, pickles, pears,
a candy bar, a chocolate shake,
an apple pie, a birthday cake,
some chips and dip, a T-bone steak…
I also have a tummy ache.

— Kenn Nesbitt

This poem was inspired by some real-life hair-raising moments in my family. When my daughter was about six years old, she decided, without warning, to cut her own hair one morning before school. Let’s just say the results were… not great. I had to do a quick fix before we dashed out the door. Then, years later, when she was a teenager, she offered to cut her older brother’s hair. That one didn’t go so well either. And, once again, I was the emergency barber. Fortunately, she never tried to cut her parents hair or give the pets a trim. But these memories made me think: what if a kid just couldn’t stop giving haircuts? This is…

My Sister Found Some Scissors

My sister found some scissors.
She climbed up on a chair.
She stood before the mirror
and snipped off all her hair.

She thought it was exciting,
and so, when she was through,
she gave the dog a haircut.
She gave the cat one too.

I even let her cut mine.
She didn’t do too bad.
But when our parents found out,
my goodness, they were mad.

She tried to be a barber.
Now she’s in trouble deep.
She practiced on our parents
while they were both asleep.

— Kenn Nesbitt

My friend and colleague Alan Katz , author of the “Silly Dilly” song books such as Take Me Out of the Bathtub, mentioned that going to be doing a performance called “The Joke Show” and he said that it’s called a “show” because you’re expected to “show up.” Since we both write funny poems, I jokingly asked if there “would be a showdown if I showed up?” As soon as I said it, I realized there was the seed of a poem in there. My wife was on the phone with her mother at the time and as soon as she hung up, she told me that her mom had given her the “lowdown.” That cinched it. I knew I had to write a showdown poem. I hope you enjoy the result.

The Showdown

The bad guys in the black hats,
and the good guys in the white,
declared there’d be a showdown
in the village square tonight.

The word went out for miles around,
so people got the lowdown.
And everyone decided they
should go down to the showdown.

With everybody driving
on the highway to the showdown,
the traffic got so bad that it
became a massive slowdown.

And in the end, the bad guys
and the good guys had no throwdown.
The roads were blocked, so nobody
could show up at the showdown.

— Kenn Nesbitt