Monday's Child is - what?

Monday's Child ...

A friend on Facebook put up an old rhyme which made her happy because she was born on a Sunday. The rhyme goes 

 Monday's child is ...

Tuesday's Child ...

Wednesday's child is ... 

Thursday's child is ...

 Friday's child is ...

Saturday's child is ...

 But the child that is born on the Sabbath day 

Is bonny and blithe and good and gay. 

 She is born on a Sunday, and very happy. The poem seems most unkind and unfair to the Wednesday child. Why condemn one seventh of the population to a life of depression? Even one minute of misery.

 I'm not even sure I'm a Wednesday child and I'm still upset, on behalf of all my Wednesday friends, acquaintances and readers.

 I know one can check easily which day of the week a date falls. I once did research to find out which diaries can be used seven years later when I found an old diary.

 I don't even want to check my day of the week, for fear of what I'll find. Instead I shall update the poem. 

  Wednesday's child is early and wise. 

 Thursday's child has all seeing eyes. 

(I tried lovely but all-seeing fits better.) I suppose I need to update the entire ditty. 

 Monday's child has a busy start 

 Tuesday's child has a happy heart 

Wednesday's child is surrounded by good 

Thursday's child always does what one should 

Friday's child has done a great job 

Saturday's child is skilled, earns a few bob 

Sunday's child is ready for rest when all the children have done their best. 

How about something less abstract and more specific and visual?

Monday's child is found to have money

Tuesday's child chews good food and gets lots of honey

Wednesday's child is happily wed

Thursday's child has a comfy bed

Friday's child is fearless and wild

Saturday's child can pass any test

But the lucky child that is born on the Sunday

Has lots of rest ready for Monday.

Copyright Angela Lansbury Angela Lansbury, writer and author. See my books on Lulu.com and Amazon.com

The Frying Pan Of Europe

The Frying Pan Of Europe by Angela Lansbury The Frying Pan of Europe
Which cities were given that visual name?

I found three places in Europe 

Each one of them in sunny Spain 

 Seek shade, avoiding the mid-day sun 

Wear a scarf or a big brim sombrero 

At night pick up your castanets 

And dance a lively flamenco 

 In the heat of the afternoon 

I sleep in, enjoying siestas

 Please wait until the evening's cool 

For processions and fiestas

 Then go to church for midnight mass 

If you're hot in the daytime at home 

Breathe incense as the candles pass 

Let heat rise to the lofty dome 

 I learned July and August 

Are months to avoid Sevilla 

And also little Ecija 

In Southern Spain, Andalucia 

 In August, in school holidays 

Parisians leave for the coast 

You're better off back in Britain 

When the beaches of Cornwall can boast 

 They are crowded with happy tourists

 Who vanished in wintery days 

For every place has its season 

When the critics return full of praise. 

-ends-

 Angela Lansbury, copyright 2017 Copyright Angela Lansbury 2017

About the author

Angela Lansbury B A Hons ACG ALB PM5 EH5 DL5 VC5 
The Author of several books, including  Etiquette For Every Occasion. Wedding Speeches & Toasts. How to be the Best Man. Quick Quotations. Who Said What When.

Blogs travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com

dressofthedayangela.blogspot.com

translateforfun.blogspot.com

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Club Vice President Public Relations (VPPR), Previous President

Join BHA 1st Wednesday 7pm and 3rd Saturday 2 pm Singapore time 

Vice President Public Relations (VP PR) of Tampines Changkat Advanced;

Secretary of weekly online Singapore International Dynamic Toastmasters Speakers’ Club;

Member and past president of Harrovians toastmasters club, UK; Past member of HOD Toastmasters, London. Past member in Singapore of: Toastmasters Club of Singapore (TCS); Tiarel; and Senja Cashew.

More details from Toastmasters International find a club.

Regular attendee at annual Swanwick Writers’ School, England.

Regular attendee at annual Writers’ Holiday, Wales.

Contributor to poetry readings, and after tea courses on: Speaking On Radio To Promote Books; and Plots And Character.

Winner of many club and area speaking contests in the UK and Singapore.

Language advisor to Empire Toastmasters club in Indonesia.

Language and speech workshops in Singapore.

Speaker on radio and TV in England, Scotland, the USA, and Australia.

Compiler of a school course on public speaking for teachers to prepare pupils for school open days with attending ceremonies before government ministers, Singapore.

Former member of Harrow Writers’ Circle, London, and two writing groups in Singapore.

Angela is on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Twitter. She would be delighted to link up with new friends.

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What Is Life? by Angela Lansbury

What Is Life by Angela Lansbury 

 “What is life if full of care 

You have no time to stand and stare?” 

That old rhyme’s out of copyright

 I’ve worried over this all night.

 The problem is too many do 

But function half as well as you 

To stare too long’s like too much drink 

Do something, don’t just worry and think 

 The man who wrote that when a tramp 

Lit by the moon and not a lamp 

Did not look after family 

Had no responsibility

 Although he wrote great poetry

 He functioned half as well as me 

He stood and stared all on his own

 He did not have a house nor home 

 My mother said, “It’s rude to stare

 Don’t offer, act, to show you care 

When you see someone else wash up 

Pick up a tea towel, dry a cup 

 Don’t go to lunch with unmade beds

 And ceilings left with spiders’ webs 

Don’t leave crumbs on the kitchen floor 

Or mice and rats will wait for more 

 My mother said you need to dust 

And keep to time, earn people’s trust 

Keep calm, in order, without strife 

Show all how well you run your life 

 When you invite your friends to call 

Go shopping in the nearest mall 

Get dressed, refreshed, look wide awake 

Put out good food, or make a cake 

 Weed the garden, plant fruit and flowers 

You’ll clean the whole house in two hours 

If your good friends are due at three 

Imagine VIPs will come for tea

 If you’ve been running round all day 

Done a good day’s work before you play 

Follow the rules and do what’s right 

Why? You’ll sleep well, safe, sound, at night 

 Then at weekends, with your house clean 

Go out with friends, to walk the green 

Tell what you’ve done, while I make tea 

With time to spare, sit, smile at me. 

 You see the old who stand and stare 

With dirty cups and uncombed hair 

We’ll never be like that old one 

No - each hour we’ll get something done. 

 Start each day with life’s doing list 

Make sure no vital task is missed 

Tick what you’ve done to show you care 

A ticked list shared is worth a stare 

 Life has no problems we can’t fix 

If we throw action in the mix 

We’ll work together as a team 

Just do it, you’ll see what I mean 

 You speak, you lead, then others follow 

What’s started today is finished tomorrow 

Not hard to be the leading one 

Let others stare at what you’ve done. 

 You learn to learn, you yearn to know, 

 You start to build, you start to grow 

I learn from you, you learn from me 

We plant a seed, we grow a tree.

 -ends- Copyright Angela Lansbury 2016. 

Copyright protects my right to be paid if this work is used commercially, to not quote the whole thing so I can still make money from selling the complete work. Copyright protects my right to be acknowledged as the author. Review allows you to quote or paraphrase a small part providing the purpose is to direct others to my work. You may copy any couplet from this page providing you attribute it to Angela Lansbury, author, or Angela Lansbury, poet, and give this page as a link. The original couplet on standing and staring was from Davies, the tramp poet.

Every Day There's Work And Play by Angela Lansbury

Every Day (there's work and play) 

by Angela Lansbury

 Every day the bright sun comes out 

Every day the robins hop about 

Every day windfalls when a lawyer reads a will 

Then the postman brings the taxman's bill 

 After breakfast we work, at eleven stop to munch 

Then we work or study then stop for lunch 

We read of the wars and troubles far away 

As the children in the schools laugh and play

 Along the street, the dogs are walking 

The garden goes quiet, the cat is stalking 

The birds see the cat so they don't stay 

When they see a cat it's best to fly away 

 We go to the doctor and he gives us a pill 

We go to the dentist and he gives us a bill 

Everywhere old people wave goodbye 

New babies born smiling get tired and cry 

 Every evening someone gets a kiss

 Somewhere some spend a day or night of bliss 

Some do right and some do wrong 

Tides go in and out, the world spins on 

 You can have a dream and make a wish 

That oceans and farms are full of fish

 That the world will always be full of men 

And the night will fall and the day start again 

 You can travel and see new smiling faces 

Stay home see old smiling faces

 Travel and see new exciting places 

Books and albums show home's old places 

 You can fly like a bird 

Or cruise on the sea 

Some things cost but others are free 

Try somebody new or stick with me 

 Every night the singers croon 

Lovers walk home by the light of the moon 

Poets re-use the same old rhymes

 Because they've stood the tests of time 

 Every day the bright sun comes out 

Evening morning the robins hop about 

Yes, the world will always be full of men 

And the night will fall, then the day's dance starts again. 

 -ends- Copyright Angela Lansbury Jan 8 2017

Poem: Raisin Children

Raisin Children 

By Angela 

 Years ago the day started with bacon and egg 

If you wanted some more you did not need to beg 

A big breakfast's a dream, 

in our new healthy scheme 

Hotel buffets, tut-tut, cost a fat arm and leg 

 Thank you, darling, for starting our breakfast with fruit 

As a sat in my silk wrap and clean birthday suit 

For more, "seconds?" we plead, as we lick the last seed As pleased picking out nuts as pirates listing loot 

A big spoon makes your milky porridge go faster 

A small spoon makes your dwindling porridge go laster 

How much food do you need? 

No, it isn't just greed 

Food is fun - plus emotional sticking plaster. 

 copyright Angela Lansbury Jan 4th 2017 

Just in case anybody missed it, there's a pun on raising children and raisin children, children raised on raisins, the modern fad for fruit and nuts. 

Costing an arm and a leg, meaning a lot of money, is also taken literally to mean making you fat. 

I hope you enjoy the alliteration: big breakfast, seconds and seek, pleased picking and pirates, listing loot, small spoon, food and fun, seconds and seed. 

Also notice assonance and rhyme: silk and milk, egg and beg and leg, dream and scheme, buffet and tut tut, buffet and fat, sat and wrap, plead and seed, need and greed, faster and laster, and plaster.