Your friend is a gem and so is this Ogden Nash-type poem. Thanks for sharing. Shirley Meneice, Zone 9 or 10, Monterey, CA, coastal area with almost no rain for 6 weeks. -----Original Message----- From: pbs-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:pbs-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Jim McKenney Sent: Friday, January 13, 2012 6:36 PM To: Pacific Bulb Society Subject: [pbs] Eudora Welty's plea to the rodents A friend sent me this during the holidays - I've got so much email that I only opened it tonight. It put a big smile on my face - some of the rhymes are as funny as some of the sentiments expressed - did she really pronounce those words that way? > > >This is from One Writer's Garden: Eudora Welty's Home Place, page 146. > > > > Squirrel, squirrel, burning bright, > Do not eat my bulbs tonight! > I think it bad and quite insidious > That you should eat my blue tigridias. > Squirrel, Sciurus vulgaris, > Leave to me my small muscaris, > Must you make your midnight snack, mouse, > Of Narcissus Mrs. Backhouse? > When you bite the pure leucojum, > Do you feel no taint of odium? > Must you chew till Kingdom Come > Hippeastrum advenum? > If in your tummy bloomed a lily, > Wouldn't you feel sort of silly? > Do you wish to tease and joke us > When you carry off a crocus? > Must you hang up in your pantries > All my Pink Queen zephyranthes? > Tell me, has it ever been thus, > Squirrels must eat the hyacinthus? > O little rodent, > I wish you wo'dn't! > > Jim McKenney