In Competition No. 3326 you were invited to submit a nursery rhyme recast in the style of a well-known poet.
One of my favourite twists on a nursery rhyme is Lewis Carroll’s ‘Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat’, the Mad Hatter’s party piece in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!
How I wonder what you’re at!
Up above the world you fly,
Like a teatray in the sky.
But ‘Twinkle, Twinkle’ popped up only occasionally in the entry, outflanked by ‘Humpty Dumpty’, ‘Jack and Jill’ and, star of the show, ‘Three Blind Mice’. David Silverman leads the way with Milton’s version. He and his fellow winners take £25.
Of murine woe and grief agrarian
Sing, Heav’nly Muse, that mortals might behold
That triune troop of mice, devoid of light,
As, paw in paw, with stumbling steps and swift
They through the farmyard squeak their sightless way –
Oh dark, dark, dark amid the blaze of noon!
While they consider how their light is spent,
There stands their ruthless, rustic Nemesis.
Mad,
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