With a mournful moan and silken tone,
Itself alone comes ONE TROMBONE.
Gliding, sliding, high notes go low;
ONE TROMBONE is playing SOLO.

Next, a TRUMPET comes along,
And sings and stings its swinging song.
It joins TROMBONE, no more alone,
And ONE and TWO-O, they’re a DUO.

Fine FRENCH HORN, its valves all oiled,
Bright and brassy, loops all coiled,
Golden yellow; joins its fellows.
TWO, now THREE-O, what a TRIO!

Now, a mellow friend, the CELLO,
Neck extended, bows a “hello”;
End pin set upon the floor,
It makes up a QUARTET—that’s FOUR.

And soaring high and moving in,
With ZIN! ZIN! ZIN! a VIOLIN,...

Did you ever hear of Mickey, how he heard a racket in the night

and shouted, “QUIET DOWN THERE!”


And fell through the dark, out of his clothes

Past the moon & his mama & papa sleeping tight



Into the light of the night kitchen?


Where the bakers who bake till the dawn so we can have cake in the morn mixed Mickey in batter, chanting:

“Milk in the batter! Milk in the batter! Stir it! Scrape it! Make it! Bake it!”


And they put that batter up to bake a delicious Mickey-cake.


But right in the middle of the steaming and the making and the smelling and the baking, Mickey poked through and said:...

Once upon a time there were three fierce robbers. They went about hidden under large black capes and tall black hats.

The first had a blunderbuss.
The second had a pepper-blower.
And the third had a huge red axe.

In the dark of the night they walked the roads, searching for victims.

They terrified everyone. Women fainted. Brave men ran. Dogs fled.

To stop carriages, the robbers blew pepper in the horses’ eyes.

With the axe, they smashed the carriage wheels.

And with the blunderbuss, they threatened the passengers and plundered them.

The robbers’ hide-out was a cave high up in the mountains. There...

Out on the islands that poke their rocky shores above the waters of Penobscot Bay, you can watch the time of the world go by, from minute to minute, hour to hour, from day to day, season to season.
You can watch a cloud peep over the Camden Hills, thirty miles away across the bay—see it slowly grow and grow as it comes nearer and nearer; see it darken the hills with its shadow; and then, see it darken, one after the other, Isleboro, Western Island, Pond Island, Hog Island, Spectacle Island, Two Bush Island—darken all the islands in between, until

you, on your island, are standing in the shadow,...