Mrs. Kitchen's Cats

William Blackburn is a professor of English at the University of
Calgary.

If you like nonsense verse, if you like zany, rollicking—and
frequently incisive—poems for children, then I beg you not to read the
back-cover blurb on this collection. That blurb, with its labored and
creaking attempt at wit, might well cause a prospective reader to
conclude that the author is just too cutesy-poo to deserve life, let
alone an audience. Happily, however, it is also a splendid illustration
of the wisdom of not judging a book by its cover. Readers who persevere
will be rewarded with a fine and varied range of high-spirited and
lively poems that can stand comparison with the works of such
practitioners as Dennis Lee. As with Lee’s work, there is much more to
this collection than simply a good deal of honest fun with noise.
Ward’s respect for his audience (“everything is little except their
little minds”) brightens every page, and he consistently shows that
nonsense verse can deal with unusual subjects, including fear, poverty
(“I am living in a box”), and the limitations of its intended
readers: “TV kids / have no brains / popcorn breath / AND REAR-END
PAINS.” All in all, this is a fine and funny collection; it should be
of particular appeal to children who know poetry only as something to be
dreaded and shunned.