|
|
Here's a children's book I have never been able to sell. It needs some good illustrations and though certain illustrators have gushed over the images this story brings up, they have not made the drawings. Any illustrators listening out there?
Eileen Dover was in love with school.
In love, that is, except for one fool.
The fool in the school was Billy Butski.
Billy pulled her ponytails and shook her chair,
called her names and shredded paper in her hair.
He sent her notes about slime balls and snakes,
and dared her to stare at him with a frowning face,
until the teacher, Miss Dante, lost her grace,
and made Eileen turn around in her place.
What a cruel fool to have sitting behind you in school -
that lurking Billy Butski.
At the end of class Eileen dashed past,
that smirking Billy Butski.
She ran into the woods
just as fast as she could
where she came to a bog
and sat down on a log
and wondered and thought
and pondered and sought
a way to change that awful fool
before he got her kicked out of school,
that creepy bleepy Bill Butski.
Eileen kicked her toes
and snorted her nose.
She moaned at the birds
and groaned dismal words.
She shouted at bees
and even complained out loud to the trees,
about that obnoxious, rhinoxerous Billy Butski.
Suddenly, loudly, from inside the log
came a resonant burp
like a milkshake's last slurp
or a tugboat lost in a fog.
"Stop moaning and groaning," came the deep-throated cries,
and when Eileen leaned over she got a surprise,
for staring at her were two huge yellow eyes.
"Who are you?" asked Eileen as she peered deeper in,
but the frog licked his lips with a fly-catching grin,
and said, "To find that out you'll have to crawl in."
"Oh no," said Eileen, "I really must not.
It's slimey in there and probably hot.
And you can't imagine the problems I've got."
"You'd be surprised what I know," said the frog with a bob.
"You've a boy in your school who's a bit of a slob."
"How did you know that?" asked Eileen with a tweet.
But the frog just licked some dirt off his feet.
He shot down a fly with the tip of his tongue,
chewed it a bit and when he was done
he said, "Boys who are cruel and boys who are mean
have only one cure - the laughing beans."
"Laughing beans? Whatever do you mean?" chuckled Eileen.
So the frog explained of the most ancient ways
taught by the teachers in the earliest days
when the earth was a garden where vegetables talked
and frogs lived in puddles where dinosaurs walked.
In those days the cure for a boy who was mean,
was expose him directly to one laughing bean.
"And where would I find such a marvelous bean?"
"The Magic Jungle is the only place they've ever been seen."
"And how do I get there?" trilled Eileen.
"Get down like a dog
and crawl through this log,"
croaked the curious yellow-skinned, blue-spotted frog.
So she got on her knees and shook like a hog,
and squeezed through the tunnel made by the log.
And as soon as she poked her head out the hole,
she knew right away she was nearer her goal.
There were talking horses and upside-down birds,
waltzing apple trees dancing in herds.
Daddy deer with antlers of mushrooms,
baby rabbits with ears made of rose blooms.
Nosy squirrels whispering out loud,
chocolate chip daisies and peach ice cream clouds.
And if you ever wondered what magic could be,
you just had to see what Eileen could see.
But she didn't forget the point of the day.
Find those laughing beans. Ask someone which way.
She asked the horses, the rabbits, the deer.
She wondered if she was making herself perfectly clear,
for though they all were polite their expressions were queer,
and none had heard of the laughing beans, no,
not anywhere near here.
Eileen sat down by a babbling brook
that sputtered out vowels like a first-grader's book.
And after a while it certainly did seem
as if, "Follow me, follow me, follow me," sang the stream.
Eileen stood up, book bag on her shoulder,
and started hopping from boulder to boulder.
Down and around and away sped the stream,
shouting and jumping like a basketball team.
She tripped over a snoring crocodile
and hoped to goodness he wouldn't get riled.
Then came a mathematical turtle with numbers etched on his shell,
and a convention of Buddhist dinosaurs ringing prayer bells.
Tail-walking fish arose from the stream
and sat around on rocks discussing their dreams.
But nowhere but nowhere was a bean to be seen.
Finally she detected a faint giggling sound,
and searching whence it came from spun round and around.
She followed the giggling into the jungle,
hop, skip, stumble, bungle.
Past squawking rainbow-colored parrots
and monkeys giving each other haircuts.
And then at last she saw what it means
to find a field full of snorting, hooting, lip-smacking
laughing beans.
There were pinto beans wearing Mexican hats,
garbanzo beans howling like dissatisfied cats.
String beans yodeling and blowing kazoos,
Lima beans that flew in all the way from Peru.
There were navy beans, black beans, soy beans too,
laughing like hyenas that broke out of a zoo.
In a matter of minutes they surrounded Miss Dover,
and right away she knew that her problems were not over.
They laughed at her nose and tickled her toes,
made fun of her clothes and mimicked her pose.
They taunted her cool with ridicule.
They cut down her pride, left her no place to hide.
Of simple politeness they broke every rule.
It was a hundred times worse than that fool - Billy Butski.
She started to whimper and started to cry.
It hurt her so much and she didn't know why.
Her chest pulled tight and her body shivered,
her knees felt weak and her cheek bones quivered.
What a ridiculous impossible incredible scene,
what a nightmare of misery, those mean laughing beans.
Eileen Dover cried all over.
She cried until she was empty of pain,
empty of bad feelings and empty of shame.
Empty of even her own very name.
She cried so much she was empty of tears,
peaceful and calm and empty of fears.
And then a strange thing came about,
like a spell that was lifted or a demon let out.
She started to titter and giggle and cheer.
She laughed so heard she fell on her rear.
She warbled and wheezed and came to rejoice.
She shouted so loudly she lost her voice.
And soon the weird beans gathered around
and "hurrahed!" to the girl's rollicking sound.
Something important and something profound
was revealed to Eileen as she sat on the ground.
All of her worries
were put on the shelf,
for she came to believe
that the problem was she,
and she was the problem herself.
Two huge yellow eyes watched incognito.
A fat sticky tongue nabbed a mosquito.
Eileen was so happy and so full of joy.
She now had a cure for that one awful boy.
Back through the jungle and back through the log,
back home for dinner and then feed the dog.
The next day in school Billy passed her a note
that said she had feet like flippers and hair like a goat.
"Billy you're funny," snorted Eileen Dover.
Then she laughed so hard her chair almost tipped over.
"What is the problem?" asked Miss Dante with a frown.
"Why break up the class? Why act like a clown?"
"Well I guess it's about this love note from Billy.
I just can't help it, it's simply so silly."
And so Miss Dante read it and laughed,
and showed it around to the rest of the class.
Billy turned red
and buried his head
and promised himself not to bug Eileen Dover
until his embarrassment was entirely over.
On the last day of school Billy covered his wrist,
ran up to Eileen and stuck out his fist.
He scared her a little and that caused him to laugh.
Then he broke a chocolate bar in two and handed her half.
"Thank you Billy," said a tickled Eileen.
"It's nothing," said Billy, "And I'm sorry I was mean."
"Thanks for that too," and she grinned like an elf.
"Thank you for teaching me to laugh at myself."
|
|
