5
WILLIE AND HIS LION
Willie had a father and Willie had a mother
That was Willie.
Willie went with his father to a little place where they sold wild animals.
If the world is round can wild animals come out of the ground.
In the place that his father took Willie wild animals did not grow there, they were not always sold there but they were always there. Everybody there had them. Wild animals were with them on the boats on the river and they went with every one in the garden and in the house. Everybody there had a wild animal and they always had them with them.
Nobody knows how the wild animals came there. If the world is round can they come out of the ground but anyway everybody had one and sometimes somebody sold one, quite often everybody sold one.
Willie’s father went to get one. Which one. That was for Willie to say. It was funny seeing wild animals in a boat, one wild animal in a rowing boat, one wild animal in a sail boat, one wild animal in a motor boat.
It was a funny place this town that is it would not have been a funny place it was just like any place only that every one always had a wild animal with them, men women and children and very often they were in the water in a boat and the wild animal with them and of course wild animals are wild, of course they are wild.
It was a funny place.
Willie went everywhere so of course he was there, beside his father had taken him there. It was a funny place. And Willie always took whatever he was given. So he hoped he would have one. Any one. Everybody had one so of course Willie would come to have one, any wild animal will do, if it belongs to you.
And Willie did come to have one.
Which one.
There were elephants, an elephant in a rowing boat, Willie did not get that one.
And a tiger in a sail boat, Willie did not get that one. Willie got a lion, not a very little one, one who looked like Rose’s dog Love only the Lion was terrifying. Any lion is, even a quite small one and this was a pretty big one. Willie began to sing, it was exciting and Willie sang and sang he did not sing to the lion but he sang about lions being exciting, about cats and tigers and dogs and bears about windows and curtains and giraffes and chairs. The giraffe’s name was Lizzie, it really was.
Willie was so excited he almost stopped singing but as soon as he saw his own lion again he began singing again. Singing and singing. This was the song he sang.
Round is around.
Lions and tigers kangaroos and canaries abound
They are bound to be around.
Why
Because the world is round
And they are always there.
Any little dog is afraid of there.
Then he sang in a whisper
Suppose it should rain
Suppose it should never be the same
And then Willie’s voice rose
The lion is what I chose.
After a long moment he sat down to cry
He said there, here I am just like my cousin Rose.
He was.
He almost was not Willie.
Oh will he again be Willie.
Not as long as he has a lion.
Not as long.
And it was getting worse and worse and then suddenly he said.
There were only two baskets of yellow peaches and I have them both.
He whispered very low.
And I have them both.
And Willie had, they were lovely round yellow peaches really round really yellow really peaches and there were only two baskets of them and Willie had them both.
And so he cheered up and decided to give the lion to his cousin Rose.