Sailing Ships and Herring Fish, the Moon and the Stars
It’s Poetry Friday and Julie Larios/The Drift Record is hosting this week.
On the floor beside my computer is a favorite book/poem of childhood, “Wynken, Blynken, and Nod,” by Eugene W. Field.
I have vague recollections of someone – my mother, probably – reading it to me. And another memory of the shoe-shaped sailing ship, and other small wooden ornaments from the poem, hanging on the wall above my sister’s bed. 
David McPhail’s illustrations take me back to the bedroom my sister and I shared, the bunnies, a shoe boat, and the stars “in that beautiful sea.
“Wynken, Blynken, and Nod one night
Sailed off in a wooden shoe –
Sailed on a river of crystal light,
Into a sea of dew.
Another book, Warriors in the Crossfire, also shares a prominent place in my office at the moment. Nancy Bo Flood’s poem titled, “Friend” puts the star-filled sky in a different light.
Friend
I miss the one
Who stares at the stars
And reaches
For the moon.
photo credit: atomicjeep
Julie Larios said:
I love Wynken, Blynken and Nod, too, Dianne – my dad used to read it to us out of a book called THE BUMPER BOOK. The idea of the moon asking me “Where are you going and what do you wish?”….well, it still gives me shivers (of delight) to think about it! And now, when my grandson and I are together, we always look outside for the moon before I tuck him into bed.
Glad to see Nancy’s poem, too!
Dianne said:
This is one of the wonderful things about sharing favorites. I learn about another great book! I’m going to look for THE BUMPER BOOK.