17 April, 2017

MONDAY TRAVELS: EASTER EGGS by Eveleen Stein



Happy Monday friends! Happy Easter to all who celebrate! May it bring you hope, new beginnings and ideas, new books and beautiful adventures! Since we have a celebration today, we'll jump back to the US for a very beautiful, and adorable children poem for Easter!

So today we are in The United States and we will explore:

EASTER EGGS




American writer Eveleen Stein:
Eveleen Stein (October 12, 1863 - December 11, 1923) was an American poet and writer who is especially well known for her children's writings. She was born in Lafayette, Indiana her entire life. Evaleen Stein probably drew some of her inspiration to write from the fact that her whole family had literary leanings. Her father, John Andrew Stein, although an attorney-at-law at Lafayette, Indiana, also did some writing and contributed to magazines. Her mother, Virginia Tomlinson Stein, wrote stories for the young, and her brother, Orth H. Stein, was a writer all his life. It was as a writer of stories for young people that Miss Stein became best known. Gabriel and the Hour Book, is considered to be one of her best works.



Poem:

Seven little nests of hay 
We have made, for Easter day 
Is to-morrow, and you know 
We must have them ready, so 
When the Rabbit comes she'll see 
We expected her, that we 
Children tried our very best 
Each to make the nicest nest. 
One is in the lilac-bush, 
Near the ground--last year a thrush 
Built a nest there--let me see, 
Two are by the apple-tree, 
In the clover--that makes three-- 
One beside the playhouse door, --
Three plus one, that must be four-- 
Two are in the tulip-bed-- 
Was it seven that I said? 
Oh, yes! six I've counted, and 
One is in our pile of sand.
    *   *   *   *   * 
Come and see!  Oh, hurry, hurry!
For the Rabbit, kind and furry, 
Has been here again and laid 
Eggs in every nest we made!
Purple, orange, red, and blue, 
Pink and green and yellow, too, 
Like a bunch of finest flowers 
Ever seen, and all are ours!
And oh, look!  What do you think!
Here our names are in white ink, 
All spelled nicely so we know 
Just where every egg should go!
Is it not surprising, quite, 
How well Easter Rabbits write?

Thoughts:


If you didn't know back in the day, when there were no painting colors and such children used to build little nests of moss and stones and grass and twigs in the yard the day before Easter Sunday.  The next morning, they'd wake up to find a colored egg or two left by the Easter rabbit in their little nest.

I think this poem is so cute and beautiful, and I even think it would be wonderful to teach such a poem as a song for the little ones. I think poems like these just has to be sang or said out loud, since they have that wonderful community feeling.

Happy Easter and

See you next Monday!