  Poetry
This week: Let it Loose for the Great Dr. Seuss! Edited by: Quizmo LaGrande  
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Last month, March 2nd to be precise, was our dear Dr. Seuss's 108th birthday. Let's take a look at the life and rhymes of Theodore Geisel, more commonly know as Dr. Seuss.
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Who doesn't love Dr. Seuss? His books have delighted children of all ages for generations. And who doesn't love to read them aloud? Okay, if you're a parent, it can get a little tiresome after reading Cat in the Hat, or Green Eggs and Ham fifty gazillion times, but with a stretch of the imagination, the rhyming prose is easy to sing. I'm not a big fan of rap music, but blurting out the words in the form of rap can be quite exhilarating. Try it. Your kids will love it.
Theodore (Ted) Geisel, author, illustrator and poet, wrote over 40 children's books translated into more than 15 languages. Geisel, although married twice, never had children of his own. He did, however, boast of the achievements of an imaginary daughter, Chrysanthemum-Pearl. He even dedicated his second children's book The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins, to "Chrysanthemum-Pearl (aged 89 months, going on 90)."
The Cat in the Hat (1957), perhaps the definitive Seuss book, was developed at the request of Random House as a primer using only 225 "new-reader" vocabulary words. In 1960, Green Eggs and Ham which went one better and contained only 50! We all must agree, Seuss's lively characters, even with their limited vocabulary, were far more entertaining than Dick and Jane.
Of course there are so many favorites, Yertle the Turtle, Horton, and don't forget the Grinch. I don't how many times I've read those books, but I still love them.
A few years back I volunteered to read for an hour or so for a first grade class once a week. It was great fun to read their favorites and mine. We read a great many books chosen from the school and classroom library. One of my favorite books of all time is Dr. Seuss's, The Sneetches, and Other Stories, but alas, I could not find it in either collection. So, being the bibliophile that I am, I searched and scrimmaged through my own book archives to find my family's trusty well-read copy.
"I found it!" I proudly regaled showing it to my then 19-year-old daughter. I read a few lines out loud..
Now, the Star-Belly Sneetches had bellies with stars.
The Plain-Belly Sneetches had none upon thars.
Those stars weren't so big. They were really so small.
You might think such a thing wouldn't matter at all...
"Keep going, Mama" she pressed, grinning.
And I did. I wound up reading her the whole book! We laughed at poor Mrs. McCabe and her too many Daves, the shook our fingers at the stubborn Zax, and shivered at the "pale green pants with nobody inside 'em." It was one of those magic mommie moments I'll never forget.
And let's hear it for Ted's mom, Henrietta Seuss Geisel, who often "chanted" nursery rhymes lull him to sleep when he was a child. Seuss credited his mom for asserting the love of rhyme and verse into his head and heart.
Yep, Dr. Seuss not only taught us to read and make reading enjoyable, he taught us lessons of kindness and caring, that a "person's a person, no matter how small," or whether or not they have "stars upon thars."
Be here's the thing...
If your kids are like mine,
you've read time after time
his fantastical words
and meticulous rhymes
till you find yourself talking,
not skipping a beat,
like the Cat in the Hat, himself, has taken a seat
behind your left ear, or maybe your right.
Either way, right or left, you can't make him take flight.
Yes, you've caught the disease,
the great rhyming dilemma,
Of a thousand two times
Reading Sneetches and then some.
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Just to prove my point...
This is a splentabulous production indeed!
And for all good intentions it needs readers to read!
A fitful rhyme I happed to find
of just the perfect Seussific kind...
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Poetry: April 04, 2012 Issue [#4966]
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