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Title: The Beet
Author: Katharine Pyle [
More Titles by Pyle]
"I will not wash my face I say;
I will not wash," cried Jane, "to-day."
In vain mamma said, "What disgrace!
To go with dirty hands and face."
Jane only sulked and hung her head,
And so she crept away to bed.
Now when the pleasant morning broke
In bed the slovenly Jane awoke;
She woke but could not turn in bed,
Nor stretch herself, nor raise her head;
She was a beet with nose and eyes,
A beet of most enormous size.
And in the bed the beet leaves green
Instead of arms and legs were seen;
And then in came mamma and nurse;
They did not know her, which was worse,
But Jane could hear mamma; she said,
"Why, why! how came this beet in bed?"
And now, by two stout boys, away
They send the beet to town next day,
That all the people there may see
How large a beet can grow to be.
They put her in a window there,
Where every one can point and stare.
There the poor sloven sits and cries,
Till beet juice oozes from her eyes;
But ah! was such sight ever seen?
The beet juice tears have washed her clean;
And then, the strangest thing of all,
As fast and faster still they fall.
The beet tears melt her back once more
Into the child she was before.
She does not stay to wipe her eyes,
But home with eager feet she hies.
"Oh mother, mother dear," cries she,
"Henceforth a cleaner child I'll be."
[The end]
Katharine Pyle's poem: Beet
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