Poetry Friday - Scholars

For all those whose year runs from August to May - that school thing!

Walter de la Mare’s

“Scholars”

Logic does well at school;
And Reason answers every question right;
Poll-parrot Memory unwinds her spool;
And Copy-cat keeps Teacher well in sight:

The Heart’s a truant; nothing does by rule;
Safe in its wisdom, is taken for a fool;
Nods through the morning on the dunce’s stool;
And wakes to dream all night.

From
The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry
Edited by Richard Ellmann and Robert O'Clair

And

From The Real Mother Goose

A diller, a dollar, a ten o’clock scholar!
What makes you come so soon?
You used to come at ten o’clock,
But now you come at noon.

I googled “A diller a dollar” and found the fascinating web site of the V & A Museum of Childhood. Included in the information about this rhyme is the fact that The Oxford Dictionary Of Nursery Rhymes by Iona and Peter Opie states that a “diller, a dollar” may refer to dilly-dally. I also learned on this site that traditional English school bells rang at 9:00 o’clock. For us 8:00 o’clockers, that extra hour would be heavenly!

In my book . . . We should strive to be logical and reasonable and memorable students, shouldn’t we? And of course we should never nap in class! But I surely like the idea of a 10:00 o’clock morning bell!