Miss Mistry was our teacher and she told us all we knew
of moons and oceans far away, and every word was true.
She told of flying dragons, wild beasts of earth and air,
celestial snouts a-smouldering, sparks leaping everywhere!

And we forgot the concrete walls, the heavy painted doors,
no longer saw the classroom with its scuffed unpolished floors.
We unrolled ancient maps, scrolls of the stars and seas,
charted astral cities where wild dragons surf the breeze.

Miss Mistry had a secret. I'm the only one who saw
that time she shed green dragon scales along the corridor.
She stared out of the window, and up into the sky,
a longing look upon her face. Flames flickered in her eye.

I watched and waited every week for just a tiny trace
of green reptilian cunning to appear upon her face.
I thought she might just scratch her head with sharply curving claw,
or throw Year Six's hamsters in her long and toothy jaw ...

And then one day it happened - I caught her breathing fire!
I watched her spread her golden wings - higher, higher, higher!
Miss Mistry had a secret. I'm the only one who knew -
she wasn't just a teacher - she was a dragon too!

She ran out of the door and with a roar, leapt for the sky -
Miss Mistry's never coming back. I know. I saw her fly.

© Lesley Moss 2015

Fairytale Rescue Services?
It's Myrtle, your favourite client.
Our pumpkin coach has been overturned
by a road-raging lump of a giant!

We HAVE to get to the Glass Slipper Ball -
Prince Charming's returned from his quest!
And it's awfully cold in the Haunted Wood,
Poor Berta's not wearing a vest ...

WHAT! Call yourselves Fairytale Rescue?!
I can hardly believe my own ears!
"Halloween is your busiest time,
you're tied up for the next hundred years?"

BEEEEEEP!

Hello? HELLLLOOOOO?! Fairytale ResCUE?

They hung up on me, Berta!

What on earth shall we DO?

Just call a Troll, Mistress Myrtle,
I really think that you should
flag down a troll, Mistress Myrtle,
to carry us safe through the wood!

And WHAT IF the Troll's bad and hungry?
WHAT IF the Troll's mad and mean?
WHAT IF the Troll hurls us over the bridge,
'Cause we don't have Jack's Magic Bean?

Oh, just trip-trap over there, Myrtle,
and ask the nice Troll for a favour.
I will not trip-trap over there, Berta.
He might take his lunch Myrtle-flavour!

Wait - maybe those three Goats can help us - 
they look so incredibly buff ...
Oh yes! See! They're crossing the Troll Bridge -
Hooray! It's the Billy Goats Gruff!


Words © 2014 Lesley Moss
Illustration © 2014 Loretta Schauer

Yes, the ogre captured us
But don't be too alarmed
He's not as scary as he seems and we have not been harmed

You see, he's vegetarian!
Whoever would have thought?
He’s put us straight to work with all the other kids he's caught

Behind his castle walls he has
Kids keeping his house clean
And kids to tend his veggie patch, the biggest ever seen

We're both in the kitchen
Where we cook the ogre's meal
(That's why this SOS is on a scrap of onion peel)

And herein lies our problem, see
The ogre's diet's strange
He only wants his onions and his tastes they never change

His breakfast’s onion porridge, then
there’s onion cake at ten
If we get out we hope to never see onions again!

The onion soup is okay
And onion stew is fine...
But onion ice-cream pudding? That is where we draw the line

The castle's good in other ways
It's warm and keeps us dry
But all this chopping onions, could make a grown man cry

Our fingers smell, our hair does too
The stench clings to our clothes
It’s like we’re walking round with sweaty socks shoved up our nose

We long to slice some aubergines!
Or bake some mushroom pies
We'd gladly peel some sprouts to have a break from weeping eyes

So know that we're alive and well
We hope this calms your fears
But please come get us soon because we're running out of tears!

Poem ©2014 Laura Louise Stewart
Illustration © 2014 Loretta Schauer

Did you hear that Troll, Doris?
Did you hear what he said,
With his, ‘Who’s that trip trapping right over my head?’

Did you hear him Doris?
Shouting out in a mood,
And you and me out walking, how dare he be rude?

I’m going back Doris,
I’ll be sweetness and light,
But if that Troll complains, I shall put up a fight. 

Well come on then Doris,
I’m so cross I could burst,
I’ll watch your back, Doris. You can go first.

Poem ©2014 Kathryn Evans
Illustration © 2014 Loretta Schauer

Since eighteen hundred and sixty,
We’ve been cursed by our own good looks,
Since the scientist Charles Robert Darwin
Hunted us  for one of his books.

He’d captured a blue footed booby
And a tortoise of marvellous age.
He’d tracked down a kind of a  dragon,
But he couldn’t get us in a cage.

We hid where he never would find us,
All eight of the family Weird,
While the Beagle sailed over the ocean,
We were on it, in Charles Darwin’s beard.

Poem ©2013 Kathryn Evans
Illustrations ©2013 Paul Morton