In The Middle of Winter
by Little Dazzy Donuts

Here’s a story poems written for the Special Show episode of the Kids’ Poetry Club podcast, released on December 21, 2020.
I hope you enjoy reading it. You can also listen to me reading it on YouTube.

It was the middle of Winter,
and the town was all dark.
The streets were all empty,
and so was the park.

The sun would lie-in,
and was getting up late,
giving no signs of daylight
until well after eight.

By four in the afternoon,
the sun had gone down,
leaving nothing but dark
all over the town.

All the people were hiding,
with nothing to do,
but play with their phones,
and watch TV too.

It was empty and boring
with no sense of hope.
Until two friends decided
they could no longer cope,

and they hatched a grand plan
to bring folks back together
with happiness and lights
whatever the weather.

The one was named Chicken:
she was artistic and kind.
Her sheep friend was Shasta,
and both were inclined

to write a fun poem
and then print it all out.
Then they cut it all up
so they could hand it about.

Each person would be given
just one of the lines,
so they’d have to all gather
to put together the rhyme.

But how would they deliver
their lines around town?
They thought and they pondered,
then they wrote it all down.

Their plan was to wait
until the middle of night,
then they’d deliver their lines
with nobody in sight.

But what if they were spotted
and it ruined the surprise?
They’d have to go out
in some sort of disguise.

So Chicken found an old coat,
all baggy and red,
and she wrapped a wool scarf
tight up ‘round her head.

Shasta was in charge of
lighting their way,
so she held tight to a flashlight
so that its rays

guided them around town,
and off the friends roamed
to deliver the first line
at the very first home.

But the front door was locked
and the windows were closed.
How could they get in?
Then Shasta proposed

that Chicken was quite small
and just the right size
to climb up to roofs
in her disguise.

She’d go to the chimneys
and slide her way down,
and leave one line of poetry
on each table in town.

So that’s what they did,
and it took them all night.
By the time they were done,
it was almost daylight.

When the town folks woke up,
what did they find?
A line from a poem
the friends left behind.

The people all wondered,
what could this line mean?
And they all left their houses
to discover a scene

where the whole town was standing
out in the road
holding pieces of a riddle
they had to decode.

They each read their lines,
and a bright little child,
said, “they’re lines from a poem,”
and everyone smiled.

They all changed places,
and re-read their lines,
and the whole poem was read out
for the very first time.

Then, the people all cheered
and felt full of joy,
and brought out to the street
some food and some toys.

They picnicked, and partied,
and played the whole day,
and when night finally fell,
they stayed out anyway.

And that’s my short story
of how two bestest friends
bought the darkness of Winter
to a very abrupt end.

Ever since that day,
people remember the time
of when they all got together
to read out this rhyme.