magic carpet

Last night I dusted off A Light in the Attic and started reading some of my favorites to Seth.

When I was in elementary school, my favorite Shel Silverstein poem was called "Sick." It is the one about the little girl who gives a rambling list of illnesses in the hopes of staying home from school only to find in the last stanza that it is Saturday. So she decides, of course, to go out and play. This was my favorite because as a child I had a bit of a history of faking illnesses to get out of school so I could completely relate to that poem.

Now here I am, twenty something years later, reading about bears in refrigerators and pet hot dogs and all the other brilliant silliness that was churned out by Shel Silverstein. And in the middle of this book, a light did go off in the attic (as was certainly intended) and now I have a new favorite which I love because I am a thirty-two and at a crossroads so I can completely relate to this poem. Here it is:

MAGIC CARPET
by Shel Silverstein

You have a magic carpet
That will whiz you through the air
To Spain or Maine or Africa
If you just tell it where.
So will you let it take you
Where you've never been before,
Or will you buy some drapes to match
And use it
On your
Floor?