I wonder who lived here,
I wonder where they went?
Did they make a living,
or were their hopes all spent?
Did they dream of copper,
digging riches from the ground?
They haven’t been forgotten
for there’s history all around.
Perhaps at night their ghosts
still venture out to roam,
stepping lightly through the gloom
to once again come home.
The old Williams cottage, Blinman, South Australia. Photo by Ginette Pestana
Hello, Daphne, by the fence,
aren’t your flowers full of scents!
You’ve been asleep all winter long,
now you’re blooming sweet and strong.
You spice the breeze and fill the air,
your flowers white, your fragrance rare.
The moment all your blooms appear,
you tell me that spring is here.
Photo credit Ginette Pestana
Why is it called a bearded iris?
There’s not a whisker in sight.
Unless, of course, it had a shave
sometime in the night.
I think it looks just great
without a bristling beard,
and it if had a moustache
that would look very weird!
Bearded iris. Photo by Ginette Pestana
On the dreamy river,
drifting with the tide,
past old shutter’d houses
where history lives inside.
Breezes tease the palms,
stir a lazy frond or two,
and in the milky sky
the heat is shining through.
The Portuguese and Dutch,
the British all were here;
five hundred years of stories
like magic can appear.
An old kampong by the Melaka River, Malaysia. Photo by Ginette Pestana
I wish that in my bathroom
I had a shower like this!
All that water tumbling —
wouldn’t it be bliss?
Cascading down my back,
in a rushing flow!
The only problem is,
where would so much water go?
I’d need a massive drainhole
to carry it away,
and one enormous tap
to turn it on each day.
Waterfall, Milford Sound, New Zealand. Photo by Ginette Pestana
My nose is buried in a book,
as I read from cover to cover,
and with every line I read,
new things I discover.
Each word makes a picture,
each picture fires my brain —
it’s such a great adventure,
how can I explain?
One day I will write a book
and everyone will read it —
an author I am going to be,
and you’d best believe it!
Image from Pexels by Min An
Out in the wilds
the daylight is dying;
the darklight is coming,
and the wind is a-sighing.
Shadows will deepen,
grow darker and soon,
with the quiet starlight,
will come the moon.
The pastures will sleep
and not waken till morn,
when at last the sun rises
and a new day is born.
North Island, New Zealand. Photo by Ginette Pestana
Word is a word
that rhymes with word.
But what about cord,
and ford and sword?
They don’t rhyme with word,
as you’ve no doubt heard.
How come English is so erratic,
so hard to learn and problematic?
My word, I wish I knew!
Photo from Pexels by Pixabay
Mary had a little lamb,
it grew into a sheep.
It got so big and woolly,
she gave it to Bo Peep.
Little Bo Peep was
minding the sheep,
eating her curds and whey,
when a massive great spider
sat down beside her
and would not go away.
She sent off a text
to her pals Jack and Jill;
with three blind mice,
they ran up the hill.
All the king’s horses ran away with the spoon
and the sheep jumped over the moon.
Photo by James Aitchison
See those trees
up to their knees
in the lake.
Branches bare,
no leaves to spare,
no boat’s wake
disturbs the sunken forest,
beneath a blazing sun,
so far from everyone,
the waters are at rest.
Lake Pamamaroo, Menindee. Photo by Ginette Pestana
Teacher’s note: Nine mainly shallow lakes make up the Menindee Lakes on the Darling River in New South Wales. Menindee was the first town established on the Darling, on the lands of the Barkindji people. The nearest major city is Broken Hill.
Australian Children’s Poetry 