Everything Is a Poem By J. Patrick Lewis

Everything Is a Poem: the Best of J. Patrick Lewis, Illus. by Maria Cristina Pritelli, 2014.

The guest author for this year's MELSA Camp Read-a-Lot is former United States Poet Laureate J. Patrick Lewis. So, one of our reading choices is any of his works and I picked Everything Is a Poem.
This includes more than 59 illustrated poems on a variety of topics written between 1982-2010. The mood ranges from serious to silly.

Poetry subjects include:

•  animals ( for example, "Elephant Bill & Jackrabbit Jack")
•  people  ("The Greatest"),
• reading ("The Gentleman Bookworm")
•  sports ("My Baseball Glove")
•  riddles and epitaphs ("A Dairy Farmer")
• Mother Nature ("Her-i-Cane")
• Places ("Okefenokee Swamp Song")
• a mix ("Say, Hay Won't You Be Mine?")

Here is my favorite silly poem in the collection:

"Snake Song"

Toad gots measles
Frog gots mumps
Both got such
Disgusting bumps.

They so ugly
It's a sin.
They be jumpin'
Out that skin.

Pay no mind
These creepy items
Close my eyes
I bite 'ems, bite 'ems.

J. Patrick Lewis