Frog and Kettle

 

 

Picture a wood fire

Next to a pond

And see there a whistling kettle

With water getting warm.

 

Picture too, a frog

Of the whistling type

And also, a few young campers,

Gone off in the night.

 

Frog and Kettle

Met in this campers’ park,

Notice what was common

Right from the start.

 

 

Both could whistle

And this you would expect:

The frog of his own volition,

The kettle, when set.

 

They talked in whistles

Both Frog and Kettle

And in each other’s company

Seemed quite settled.

 

All was going well

Until Kettle told a joke

About some frogs in hot water

Without a hope.

 

 

These couldn’t whistle

But were having fun

And when the water got boiling

They were all done.

 

Kettle was laughing

At these silly frogs’ state

And this filled the whistling frog

With seething hate.

 

He thought of a way

To make Kettle pay

For the fun poked at his cousins

On that fateful day.

  

He started to whistle

Like never before

Such that Kettle could not be heard

And became sore.

 

A host of other frogs

Joined in the din

And nobody rescued Kettle

From the fired-rim.

 

 

All Kettle whistled

None could hear

For the whistles of the frogs

Just pierced the air.

 

Water boiled out

And Kettle was warped,

No more shiny appearance

And whistle abort.

 

Whistled he did

But nobody would respond

And now Kettle lies rusted

In the park’s pond.

 

Kettle made fun

Of whistling frog’s family

And now Kettle lays buried

In obscurity.

 

No more whistling

Like whistling frog

But reduced in his watery grave

To a bubbling sob.

 

Stewart Russell © November 16, 2024