Please help me find a poem!!!

[SadUselessMum]

My 13 year old daughter wants to read a poem out at school as part of National Poetry Day. This is unheard of as she is normally very shy and would never volunteer for anything!!

So we are very pleased! However…..she has no idea of a poem to read and it’s in 2 days!

She says she wants a funny one but nothing embarrassing. She goes to quite a sensible, mature school so it would need to not be a silly, young one.

Has anyone got any ideas? English is not my first language so poems are a bit of a mystery to me. Any help would be gratefully received!

This has often been voted the nation’s favourite poem, and is humorous https://allingoodrhyme.wordpress.com/2014/09/23/warning-by-jenny-joseph/#:~:text='Warning'%20–%20although%20ostensibly%20an,is%20a%20thing%20to%20celebrate.

She cannot possibly read that, she is shy and sounds like it would be inappropriate for her school, well any school come to that. I'm guessing your suggestion is a joke!
It's my favourite poem.

So many amazing poems! I have had a fantastic two hours reading them all. Thank you so much! I have printed about 10 out for her to have a look at tomorrow. So thankful to everyone!

there was also another child who did the poem about two raindrops racing down the window pane - sorry can't remember the name but it was good

Waiting at the Window, by A A Milne. A sweet poem, not too long.

A A Milne's poems are worth looking at, as are Hilaire Belloc's. I think I could probably still recite the whole of Matilda, Who Told Lies and Was Burnt to Death, nearly 50 years after I learned it for a poetry competition!

Have a look at Mary Oliver. Wild Geese is wonderful and maybe less common than some other choices. It flows beautifully too- good for reciting. I'd steer her away from funny- it's really hard and it's easy to be thrown off track if people laugh-and if they don't!

Too long?

I take it they no longer do debating in schools anymore?

*Fescue *

this isn’t a debating competition though is it? And the child in question is supposed to be sharing a little poem with her class not boring them to death with an epic.🙄

And whoever suggested Goblin Market clearly knows nothing at all about it.
it’s really not appropriate for a 13 year old to be reading out a poem about virgins sucking off goblins. (And it’s about 10 pages long)

I love the positive messaging behind this poem, written by a teenager.

I shall just leave this here 😊

What!!!! We never discussed that part when we did it at school!! Many apologies OP

It was put to us as a warning against temptation but there was no mention of sex (1970's interpretation). I wasn't suggesting she recited all of it just the first part

John Betjeman - a few might work.

Purplebunnie

no worries! It is pretty filthy but I’m sure some teachers do teach it literally.

Brian Bilston would fit the bill.

Pam Ayre's
'I wish I looked after me teeth'
Would fit all your DD's requirements!
Easy to read, great rhyming, fun without being silly, and has a good moral to the story!

What did she go for in the end @SadUselessMum ?

Betjeman?