Companions

Thanks to the generosity of Myrna Levy a copy of the Nelson reader Magic and Make-Believe is housed in the Lillian H. Smith Collection. Within its pages I found a delightfully engaging list of possible pets. Tagged as enriched content, the poem by Judith Lawrence of puppet fame (Casey and Finnegan from Mr. Dressup) has me hankering to inhabit the fictional world spun out of the work of Anne McCaffrey of the Dragonriders of Pern fame and there is of course that most marvellous tribute to McCaffrey by Samuel R. Delany in Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand where the hunt turns out to be connecting one's consciousness with the flying dragon which is followed afterward by the appropriate response: singing of the experience. Mind blowing. Well before all this sci-fi, I apparently soaked up an appreciation for dragons from my school reader via Judith Lawrence's poem.

The Pet for Me

Some people like a dog
To play around the house.
Some people like a kitten,
A hamster, or a mouse.
Some people keep a fish
In a bowl made of glass.
Some people like a bird
That whistles when they pass.

But I would like a dragon
With red, shinning eyes —
A friendly green dragon,
Just my size!
Wouldn't you?!

And so for day 1204
31.03.2010