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Jaberwocky - Lewis Carol

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!”

He took his vorpal sword in hand;

Long time the manxome foe he sought—

So rested he by the Tumtum tree

And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

He left it dead, and with its head

He went galumphing back.

“And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!”

He chortled in his joy.

’Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

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Life Doesn't Frighten me

by: Maya Angelou

Shadows on the wall
Noises down the hall
Life doesn't frighten me at all

Bad dogs barking loud
Big ghosts in a cloud
Life doesn't frighten me at all

Mean old Mother Goose
Lions on the loose
They don't frighten me at all

Dragons breathing flame
On my counterpane
That doesn't frighten me at all.

I go boo
Make them shoo
I make fun
Way they run
I won't cry
So they fly
I just smile
They go wild

Life doesn't frighten me at all.

Tough guys fight
All alone at night
Life doesn't frighten me at all.

Panthers in the park
Strangers in the dark
No, they don't frighten me at all.

That new classroom where
Boys all pull my hair
(Kissy little girls
With their hair in curls)
They don't frighten me at all.

Don't show me frogs and snakes
And listen for my scream,
If I'm afraid at all
It's only in my dreams.

I've got a magic charm
That I keep up my sleeve
I can walk the ocean floor
And never have to breathe.

Life doesn't frighten me at all
Not at all
Not at all.

Life doesn't frighten me at all.

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Me, Frida, and the Secret of the Peacock Ring

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Me, Frida, and the Secret of the Peacock Ring

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Me, Frida, and the Secret of the Peacock Ring (excerpt)

by: Angela Cervantes

Paloma lifted her suitcase onto the bed in her new room, which was painted a bright, cheerful yellow. She felt like a sunflower had swallowed her up, and she liked it. In Kansas, her walls were "barely beige." Paloma's mom had called it a "nice neutral color" that would match everything, but Paloma argued that "barely beige" was a crayon box reject and an insult to flowers and rainbows. At home, she covered the barely beige walls with as many posters as she could.

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Sunrise Over Fallujah (Excerpt)

by: Walter Dean Myers

The afternoon sky was dazzling white above the small village. The room we entered was dark and smelly and for a moment I was blinded by the contrast. There were only a few candles lit against one wall. When my eyes became accustomed to the darkness I saw that there were mats lined up along the floor. There were a few women on them, but most bodies lying side by side were children.

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When great Tress Fall

by: Maya Angelou

When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safety.

When great trees fall
in forests,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die,
the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breathe, briefly.
Our eyes, briefly,
see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.

Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependent upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their
radiance,
fall away.
We are not so much maddened
as reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.

And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregularly. Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whisper to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.

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Shadowshaper (excerpt)

by: Daniel José Older

When Neville smiled, his narrow cheeks seemed to fold into themselves to make room for that great wide mouth.

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The Light of a Candle

by: Yosa Buson

The light of a candle

Is transferred to another candle —

spring twilight.

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The Earth Shakes

by: Steve Sanfield

The earth shakes

just enough

to remind us.

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Somewhere in the Darkness (excerpt)

by: Walter Dean Myers

Some more people came into the diner. They were working people and mostly black. One man was tall with a long neck. He wore a belt with tools on it. Jimmy tried to figure out what he did. There were three different kinds of pliers on the broad leather belt he wore, all with red handles, a few screwdrivers, and one tool that Jimmy had never seen before. The man straddled a stool as if it were a horse and started reading his newspaper. The man who had taken their order brought the tall man coffee and a doughnut without exchanging words with him.

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The Old Pond

by: Matsuo Bashō

An old silent pond

A frog jumps into the pond—

Splash! Silence again.