Keep a Poem in Your Pocket
by Beatrice Schenk de Regniers
The Poem:
"Keep a poem in your pocket
And a picture in your head
And you'll never feel lonely
At night when you're in bed.
The little poem will sing to you
And the little picture will bring to you
A dozen dreams to dance to you
At night when you're in bed.
So
Keep a picture in your pocket
And a poem in your head
And you'll never feel lonely
At night when you're in bed."
Summary of the Poem:
In this sweet poem, the poet advices us to keep a poem in our pocket and a picture in our head. If we do so, we will never feel lonely when we are in bed at night. The little poem will make us sing and the little picture will make us dream sweet dreams.
After proving these logics, the poet again advices us to keep a picture in our pocket and a poem in our head. She again repeats the two lines to emphasise the fact that the picture and the poem will never let us feel alone when we go to bed at night.
Comprehension
A. Choose the correct options.
1. You'll never feel lonely if you keep in your pocket _______
a. a book. [ ]
b. a poem. [✓]
c. a story. [ ]
2. The little poem will ________
a. read to you. [ ]
b. play with you. [ ]
c. sing to you. [✓]
B. Answer the questions.
1. What does the speaker ask you to keep in your head in the first stanza?
= The speaker asks us to keep a picture in our head in the first stanza.
2. When do we feel lonely?
= We feel lonely when we are in bed at night.
3. Who will bring dreams to you?
= The little picture will bring dreams to us.
C. Read the lines and answer the questions.
1. "And you'll never feel lonely
At night when you're in bed."
a. Who said these lines?
= The poet said these lines.
b. How will you never feel lonely at night?
= We will never feel lonely at night if we keep a poem and a picture with us. The poem will sing to us and the little picture will bring us many dreams.
2. "And the little picture bring to you
A dozen dreams to dance to you."
a. When do we dream?
= We dream when are in bed at night.
b. How can a picture bring dreams to us?
= A picture can bring dreams to us when we go to bed for sleeping at night. The picture stays in our subconscious mind and make us dream many dreams.
D. Think and answer.
1. How could we keep a poem in our pocket or head?
= We can keep a poem in our pocket or head by learning it by heart.
2. Do you like books with pictures or without pictures? Why?
= I like books with pictures. Because the pictures beside the text let us imagine about what we read. This expands the horizon of our imagination and it helps the child to get through the story or the poem well.
3. What is the difference in the first two lines of the first stanza and the last stanza?
= In the first stanza, the poet has said to keep a poem in pocket but to keep it in head in the last stanza. In the first stanza, the poet has said to keep the picture in head, but to keep it in pocket in the last stanza.
About the Poet:
Beatrice Schenk de Regniers was born on 16 August 1914 in Lafayette, Indiana. She was an American writer of children's picture books. Her first book was The Giant Story, a picture book illustrated by Maurice Sendak. She wrote over 50 books. Some of her books were published under the pseudonym Tamara Kitt. May I Bring a Friend? is one of her most popular stories. She passed away on March 1, 2000.