This is another of those afd_b posts that could have been 2038 verses long if it wasn't for the fact I get paid to work and not to write prose with more than 2037 verses. For myself, some of the magic of Shel Silverstein's work was in the drawings or doodles that accompanied the prose. My computer is sadly not so friendly. I suppose you could print the following out and doodle on the paper, but for the full effect I suggest taking a crayon (red perhaps or maybe blue or whatever) and colouring on the screen so that others can enjoy it too. Shel taught me a lot about thinking of others......
Uncle Shelby won't be coming out today
he's left and gone, I'm sad to say
just packed his things and left I guess
without a note or forward address
and now he is just a child of air
lingering in a garden somewhere
I looked up to my blue bookcase
up to where last I had seen his face
and that's where he was stuffed in place
just to the left of Michener's Space
No wonder then Shelby met his fate
all stuffed in there to suffocate
So children take down your books if you please
Open them up, give them room to breathe
Stretch your eyes and feed your head
We'll have a rainy day instead
There's no point running out to play
Uncle Shelby won't be coming out today
How in my youth this shady tree
his fruits of labours nourished me
I'd plead to the woodsman to spare thee,
but we both know it's not to be
and yet I'm thankful for what I found
among your leaves scattered to ground
And if I scrunch my face up tight
I suppose that for a minute I might
manage to get my ears to fizz
and stretch my mind as wide as his
and see in colours I've never seen
like floople and pizzazzmarine
My daughter makes these faces too
It's something that we learned from you
to laugh and play and write and draw
give birth to mirth and HAW HAW HAW
and so it hurts me now to say
Uncle Shelby won't be coming out today
A little piece of me is gone
a little piece of you lives on
in bedtime stories and silly songs
in morning glories and sing-a-longs
in stick-pictures in the sand
and mud-pie mixtures mom can't stand
Her crayons sing her stuffed cow talks
A boa constrictor eats her socks
Unicorns and boys named Sue
And several voices that I do
they entertain us all day through
so much of them are thanks to you
So goodbye from your childhood friends
Sitting where the sidewalk ends
We remember all the things you taught
and do the things we oughtn't not
Perhaps one day we'll visit and say
Can Uncle Shelby come out to play?
Return to the
Theatre of the Imaginary