Literature / Falling Up (Silverstein)

I tripped on my shoelace
And I fell up—
Up to the roof tops,
Up over the town,
Up past the tree tops,
Up over the mountains,
Up where the colors
Blend into the sounds.
But it got me so dizzy
When I looked around,
I got sick to my stomach
And I threw down.

— "Falling Up"

Falling Up is a 1996 poetry collection written and illustrated by Shel Silverstein. It contains 144 poems. The special edition, published 2015, contains an additional 12 poems.

Poems

Regular Edition

• Advice
• Allison Beals and Her 25 Eels
• Alphabalance
• Bad Cold
• A Battle in the Sky
• The Bear, the Fire, and the Snow
• Best Mask?
• Big Eating Contest
• Bituminous?
• Blood-Curdling Story
• Body Language
• Camp Wonderful
• Carrots
• The Castle
• A Cat, a Kid, and a Mom
• Cat Jacks
• Cereal
• Christmas Dog
• Clean Gene
• A Closet Full of Shoes
• Complainin' Jack
• Cookwitch Sandwich
• Crazy Dream
• Crystal Ball
• Dancin' in the Rain
• Danny O'Dare
• Deadly Eye
• Dentist Dan
• Description
• Diving Board
• Don the Dragon's Birthday
• Eggs Rated
• Every Lunchtime
• Falling Up
• Feeding Time
• The Folks Inside
• Foot Repair
• Forgetful Paul Revere
• The Former Foreman's Story
• Furniture Bash
• Gardener
• Glub—Glub
• The Gnome, the Gnat, and the Gnu
• Golden Goose
• Hand Holding
• Hard to Please
• Haunted
• Headless Town
• Headphone Harold
• Help!
• Hi-Monster
• Human Balloon
• Hungry Kid Island
• Hypnotized
• Ice Cream Stop
• Imagining
• In the Land of...
• James
• Kanga Ruby
• Keepin' Count
• Keep-Out House
• Little Hoarse
• Little Pig's Treat
• Long-Leg Lou and Short-Leg Sue
• Long Scarf
• Lyin' Larry
• Mari-Lou's Ride
• Medusa
• Mirror, Mirror
• Mister Moody
• Molly's Folly
• The Monkey
• Morgan's Curse
• The Mummy
• Music Lesson
• My Nose Garden
• My Robot
• My Sneaky Cousin
• The Nap Taker
• Needles and Pins
• New World
• No
• No Grown-Ups
• No Thank You
• Noise Day
• Nope
• Obedient
• Ooh!
• One Out of Sixteen
• People Zoo
• Pinocchio
• Plugging In
• Poison-Tester
• The Porky
• Quality Time
• Reachin' Richard
• Red Flowers for You
• Remote-a-Dad
• Rotten Convention
• The Runners
• The Sack Race
• Safe?
• Scale
• Screamin' Millie
• Settin' Around
• Shanna in the Sauna
• Sharing
• Shoe Talk
• Short Kid
• Show Fish
• Sidewalking
• The Smile Makers
• Snowball
• Somethin' New
• Sorry I Spilled It
• Spoiled Brat
• Stone Airplane
• Stork Story
• Strange Restaurant
• Stupid Pencil Maker
• Sun Hat
• Sybil the Magician's Last Show
• Tattooin' Ruth
• Tell Me
• They Say I Have...
• Three O'Clock
• Three Stings
• The Tongue Sticker-Outer
• The Toy Eater
• Turkey?
• Unfair
• A Use for a Moose
• The Voice
• Warmhearted
• Wastebasket Brother
• The Weavers
• Web-Foot Woe
• Weird-Bird
• We're Out of Paint, So...
• When I Was Your Age
• Why Is It?
• Woulda-Coulda-Shoulda
• Writer Waiting
• Yuck

Special Edition Extras

• A Board on the Ocean
• Four Criers
• Gymnasties
• The Human Race
• Making a Friend
• The Octopus
• Pilla Fight
• The Poet Tree
• Punctuation
• Rainglasses
• Trombone Lesson
• Yawn!

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Contains examples of:

• Absurdly Dedicated Worker: The poem "Obedient" has a disobedient student be told to stand in the corner of the classroom as punishment. When class ends, though, the teacher forgets to tell him he can go home, and he keeps standing there in an attempt to prove he's good. By the end of the poem, the school has closed, the building is abandoned, and he's been waiting there for forty years.
• Abusive Parents:
  • In the poem "Every Lunchtime," the kid's mother packs a venomous snake in his lunch every day.
  • In the poem "Quality Time," a father takes his daughter golfing... and uses her as a tee.
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: The poem "My Robot" has a girl building a robot to do chores for her, only for the robot to demand the girl to do work for it.
• Alone in a Crowd:
  • In "Hand Holding", a little boy finds himself without a hand to hold in a group where everyone else is holding hands.
  • In "Settin' Around", a boy initially sits around a campfire with three monsters but ends up being all alone after they are scared off by his frightening stories.
• An Aesop: "The Gnome, the Gnat, and the Gnu" teaches a moral lesson about treating others with kindness and empathy, even when provoked.
• Angry Guard Dog: "Christmas Dog". He mistakes Santa Claus for an intruder and chases him away.
• Angry Mob Song: In "Ice Cream Stop", when the circus animals are denied any ice cream until the vendor is paid, the animals collectively express their frustration and demand for ice cream, creating a cacophony of sounds and voices in protest.
• Anthropomorphic Food: The poem "James" gives human-like traits and names to hamburgers, suggesting that they have individual identities.
• Artistic License – Biology: "Imagining" humorously presents the idea of a girl imagining a mouse in her hair, which is not biologically plausible. Additionally, the revelation of an elephant being there instead further exaggerates the biological inaccuracy.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • In the poem "Hi-Monster", the narrator points out that a monster is coming through the mist (the readers see its large, scaly tail stretching across the entire page). He guesses that the monster is huge based on how long its tail is, but on the next page, the monster is shown to not only have a small head, but a polite demeanor as well.
  • In "Haunted", the narrator initially dares his friends to explore a creepy haunted house, describing all the horrors inside. However, he eventually realizes that the dare is silly and suggests going for ice cream instead.
• Balloonacy: The poem "Human Balloon" portrays a character who inflates like a balloon and floats in the air due to excessive consumption of carbonated drinks.
• Beauty Is Bad: The poem "Medusa" portrays Medusa's struggle to style her hair due to the conflicting opinions of the snakes.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: In "Golden Goose", the narrator expresses frustration and regret over the challenges posed by the golden eggs that the golden goose laid, suggesting that ordinary eggs would have been preferable.
• Beware the Nice Ones: In "Music Lesson", a girl laments her choice of instrument and expresses frustration with her piano teacher because he makes her carry the piano up seven flights of stairs, implying that he may not be as gentle or kind as his demeanor suggests.
• Beware the Silly Ones: "Dentist Dan" presents the titular dentist as a seemingly whimsical and fun character, but his unorthodox practices have resulted in a boy losing most of his teeth.
• Bigger on the Inside: In "The Castle", the narrator explains that the castle appears thin from the outside, but once you enter, there is more space to wander about than expected.
• Bittersweet Ending: Played with in "Big Eating Contest", where a man wins the first prize of $5 in the eating contest but is left feeling exasperated and frustrated due to the high expenses and hospital bill he incurred.
• Bizarre Alien Biology: The poem "My Nose Garden" describes a garden filled with noses that grow and exhibit unusual behaviors, such as catching colds and causing a mess.
• Body Horror:
  • In the poem "Screamin' Millie", Millie McDeevit screams so loud that her head literally explodes, being described in gruesome detail from her eyebrows steaming to her teeth falling out, right down to her head flying right off her body.
  • "Tattooin' Ruth" presents the idea of permanently tattooing clothes onto a person's body. The concept of altering one's physical appearance in such a drastic and irreversible manner can be unsettling or disturbing, especially when it deviates from societal norms.
• Breath Weapon: "Don the Dragon's Birthday" describes Don the Dragon lighting the candles on his cake with his fiery breath.
• Brutal Honesty: In "Mirror Mirror", the Magic Mirror repeatedly tells the Evil Queen that Snow White is the fairest, regardless of the Queen's desire for a different answer.
• Butt-Monkey: In "Mummy", a boy wraps himself in toilet paper to resemble a mummy, expecting others to find it amusing, but instead becomes the target of ridicule and mockery.
• Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": "James" presents hamburgers with names typically associated with human beings, creating a playful twist on the concept of naming food items.
• Carnivore Confusion: In "Strange Restaurant," the narrator walks into a restaurant and tries to order various meat dishes only to find that the restaurant is staffed with various animals - the waitress is a cow, the busboy is a hen, and the chef is a fish. The narrator eventually settles for a salad, but even that is not possible, as the owner is a head of cabbage!
• Cats Are Mean: The poem "No Thank You" depicts the negative aspects of owning cats, including long hair in cereal, midnight meowing, scratching furniture, and the smell of cat litter.
• Cats Are Superior: In the aforementioned "No Thank You", the narrator rejects the offer of a kitten, emphasizing the downsides of owning cats and expressing a preference for other animals like apes, lions, or even pigs.
• Chain Reaction Destruction: In "Furniture Bash", the initial actions of one piece of furniture lead to a series of escalating interactions, causing widespread destruction among the other pieces.
• The Charmer: The poem "Danny O'Dare" depicts a dancing bear called Danny O'Dare bowing charmingly, winking, and smiling at a girl, suggesting his desire to dance with her.
• Chekhov's Gun: "Imagining" introduces the idea of a mouse in a girl's hair, creating anticipation and expectation. However, the presence of an elephant, which is not initially mentioned, becomes a surprising twist.
• Cloudcuckoolander: The boy in "Gardener" believes that he can water plants by urinating on them.
• The Cobbler's Children Have No Shoes: "Foot Repair" portrays the cobbler being skilled at repairing shoes but charging a significant amount for his services, causing the boy to question the value of the repair compared to purchasing new feet.
• Comedic Spanking: "Molly's Folly" describes Molly falling on her pet collie after a failed attempt at a skateboard trick and the collie's reaction of biting her "on her lolly", resulting in an unpleasant and humorous consequence.
• Comically Missing the Point: In "My Robot", the robot responds to the girl's requests with literal or sarcastic remarks that deflect the intended meaning.
• Companion Cube: The poem "Snowball," in which the narrator makes himself a pet snowball. It melts.
• The Complainer Is Always Wrong:
  • The poem "Complainin' Jack" has a girl's jack-in-a-box complaining about various things. The girl eventually gets tired of it and shuts him back in.
  • In "No Thank You", the narrator expresses his aversion to owning a kitten and lists various negative experiences with cats.
• Couldn't Find a Tissue: The poem "Bad Cold" is about a man who has such a serious cold that he has to resort to using items like bath towels, clothes, bedsheets, and a flag to sneeze into. The cold only goes away when he's able to sneeze into a circus tent.
• Creepy Good: The poem "Blood-Curdling Story" describes a horror story that is creepy, spooky, and gruesome, but the narrator still asks for it to be told again, indicating a strange enjoyment or fascination with the unsettling elements.
• Cunning Like a Fox: "Cat Jacks" describes the jaguar cat picking up an extra jack (nine) when she gets an eight, suggesting a clever and deceitful strategy to gain an advantage.
• Cuteness Proximity: "Ooh!" describes a child petting various adorable baby animals at a petting zoo, such as the baby gnu, cockatoo, and kangaroo.
• Cutting the Knot: In "Mirror, Mirror", when the evil queen's magic mirror won't tell her she's the most beautiful in the land no matter how many times she asks, she threatens to smash it until it gives her the answer she wants. It works.
• Dance Party Ending: The poem "Danny O'Dare" describes Danny showcasing a variety of dance moves, from the Funky Chicken to the Hokey-Pokey, ultimately leading to a joyful and energetic conclusion.
• Depraved Dentist: "Dentist Dan" describes Dan's unorthodox practices, such as cleaning teeth with maple syrup and filling cavities with chocolate, which results in his patients losing their teeth.
• Didn't Think This Through:
  • In "Keep-Out House", the narrator builds a house with no windows or doors so nobody else can get in. He then realizes that he can't get in, either.
  • The eponymous "Stone Airplane" is Exactly What It Says on the Tin. Its creator, presumably unable to get it off the ground, can only say, "I guess I like staying at home."
• Disproportionate Retribution:
  • In "The Former Foreman's Story", the foreman speculates that being fired from his position may be due to the mistaken demolition of the neighboring house, suggesting that the consequence was severe compared to the mistake made.
  • At the end of "Spoiled Brat", the brat is cooked up in a stew, which can be seen as an extreme or disproportionate punishment for her behavior.
  • In "Turkey?", a boy's act of eating a drumstick (which he believed to be a turkey drumstick) leads to everyone being mad at him, particularly the drummer, despite the seemingly minor offense.
• Double Standard: The poem "Sharing" focuses on a child who is willing to share others' belongings but struggles with sharing their own.
• Duck!: The poem "Web-Foot Woe" is told from the perspective of a waterfowl, accompanied by an illustration of it failing to notice a knife being thrown at it.
• Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: "The Bear, the Fire, and the Snow". The bear fears the snow, the snow fears the fire, the fire fears the river, and the river fears the bear.
• Epic Fail:
  • "Advice" humorously describes William Tell's unsuccessful attempt at shooting the apple and hitting his son's forehead instead.
  • In "The Former Foreman's Story", the foreman and his crew's demolition project goes awry when they target the wrong house, resulting in unintended destruction and confusion.
  • "Molly's Folly" describes Molly attempting an ollie on her skateboard but ending up falling on her pet collie instead.
  • "The Monkey" describes the monkey's ill-fated decision to eat seven green bananas, resulting in a stomachache and the need to call a doctor.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": "James" suggests that hamburgers have individual names, but people may refer to them with generic nicknames like Bunky or Bean.
• Exact Words:
  • Invoked in the poem "Obedient", in which a disobedient student is told by his teacher to go stand in the corner until she tells him he can turn around. He complies — but she never tells him, and he is forgotten soon after. He stands there in the corner all through the weekend, which leads into summer vacation. Soon after, the school is closed down and relocated, all while this boy continues to stand there for forty years as he waits for the teacher to say, "Turn around." In conclusion...
    This might not be just what she meant,
    But me — I'm so obedient.
  • In the poem "Cookwitch Sandwich", a boy asks Katrina the Cook (who is actually a witch) to make him a sandwich; she takes this instruction literally and turns him into one.
  • In the poem "Short Kid", a boy talks about how people told him he'd "grow another foot" when he got older. But instead of getting taller, the boy actually has another foot growing out of his head.
  • In "Foot Repair", the cobbler offers to repair the boy's "soles and heels," which the boy interprets as a simple repair, but is surprised by the cost.
• Extreme Doormat: The poem "Clean Gene" portrays a boy who goes to extreme lengths to keep himself clean and germ-free, even hiring someone to wipe away his sweat and building a shower above his bed.
• Eye Scream: In "Carrots", a boy hears that carrots are good for your eyesight and stabs a carrot into each of his eyes. He asks if he's not doing it right.
• Failed a Spot Check: In "Mummy", a boy wraps himself in toilet paper, thinking it would be funny, but fails to realize that others do not find it amusing.
• Fearful Symmetry: The poem "The Bear, the Fire, and the Snow" presents a cycle of fear and apprehension between the bear, the snow, the fire, and the river. Each entity expresses fear of another, creating a symmetrical pattern of fear.
• Fingore: The poem "Ooh!" has a boy petting a tiger cub, which results in him getting his fingers bitten clean off.
• Forgetful Jones: "Forgetful Paul Revere" portrays Paul Revere struggling to remember the exact order of his commands for signaling the arrival of the British forces.
• Forgotten Birthday: "Show Fish", describes a boy forgetting to bring a flounder he caught to school for show and tell. He remembers to bring it in two weeks later, although the fish is now rotten.
• The "Fun" in "Funeral": In "Shanna in the Sauna", one person's attempts to make the sauna experience appealing by mentioning dangerous animals result in the other person becoming increasingly reluctant and unwilling to join.
• Generation Xerox: "A Cat, a Kid, and a Mom" depicts the child questioning why the mother tries to make them like her and the mother questioning why the child behaves in ways that the mother deems familiar or reminiscent of her own experiences.
• Genius Loci: "Hungry Kid Island" is about this. A girl rows out to Hungry Kid Island, imagining it to be full of starving children who will gladly have lunch with her. Only there are no kids on the island - as the island itself is a giant hungry kid!
• Genre Savvy: In "Blood-Curdling Story", the narrator displays familiarity with horror story tropes and expectations, recognizing the creepy, spooky, and gruesome elements and finding them appealing despite their unsettling nature.
• Giant Eye of Doom: In the poem "The Deadly Eye", the narrator warns the readers about the Deadly Eye of Poogly-Pie, which can kill anyone just by looking at them.
• God Is Flawed: The poem "Description" portrays the various conflicting descriptions of God from different characters, suggesting that no one has a definitive or accurate understanding of God's appearance.
• Gory Discretion Shot: "Screamin' Millie" describes the aftermath of Millie's scream without explicitly depicting the graphic details.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: In "Medusa", the snakes in Medusa's hair become increasingly agitated and loud while expressing their conflicting opinions on how she should style them.
• Headphones Equal Isolation: The poem "Headphone Harold". The titular character prefers to listen to the music on his headphones rather than the people and noises around him. However, this habit gets him into trouble when he walks onto the train tracks.
• Heroic Dog: "Christmas Dog" depicts the dog bravely defending the house and the family's Christmas traditions from the perceived threat of Santa Claus, scaring him away with its barking and growling.
• Human Cannonball: "Mari-Lou's Ride" describes Mari-Lou being catapulted through the air on a broken swing and eventually landing in her mother's lap.
• Hypocritical Humor: "Warmhearted" portrays Beatrice Bright as an animal rights activist who wears a live fox fur, which seems incongruous with her cause.
• I Just Want to Be Normal: In "People Zoo", the boy, despite being treated as a spectacle in the People Zoo, stubbornly refuses to perform tricks and instead chooses to sit and think.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Defied in "Spoiled Brat". The spoiled brat falls into a pot and gets cooked with spices and vegetables, but nobody will eat her because she's spoiled.
• Improbable Aiming Skills: Played with in "Advice", as it references William Tell's legendary archery abilities, even though he fails to hit the apple in this instance.
• Inventory Management Puzzle: "A Closet Full of Shoes" depicts a girl's struggle to find a missing shoe in her extensive collection, highlighting the challenge of organizing and keeping track of a large number of items.
• Ironic Hell: In the poem "Camp Wonderful", a child anticipates hating the supposedly wonderful Camp Wonderful, despite its idyllic descriptions and positive reputation.
• Karmic Death: The brat in "Spoiled Brat" falls into a cooking pot and gets cooked up in a stew as a consequence of her actions.
• Killer Rabbit: "Sybil The Magician's Last Show." The eponymous magician can't be bothered to buy food for her rabbit, so when she goes to pull him out of her hat one night, he pulls her into the hat and eats her.
• Like Goes with Like: In "Long-Leg Lou and Short-Leg Sue," the two characters go out walking together, but Long-Leg Lou gets frustrated that Short-Leg Sue can't walk as fast as him and decides to go walking with someone else. Short-Leg Sue goes walking with Slow-Foot Pete.
• Literal Metaphor: "Human Balloon" describes a man who becomes a literal balloon after consuming sodas, emphasizing the physical transformation and the humorous consequences of his actions.
• Literal-Minded:
  • In the poem "Little Hoarse", a man says he has a hoarse throat, but some children interpret his words literally and proceed to treat him as if he were a horse, complete with a saddle.
  • "Alphabalance" humorously depicts a boy's attempt to physically balance the entire alphabet in his arms, taking the concept of "balancing the AB Cs" quite literally.
  • In "Carrots", a boy takes the statement about carrots improving eyesight literally and sticks them in his eyes, expecting an immediate improvement.
  • In "Forgetful Paul Revere", Paul Revere contemplates different possibilities and variations of his commands, taking each one literally and trying to recall the exact wording.
  • In "Gardener", a boy, when told to water the plants, interprets it in a literal sense and urinates on them instead of using water.
  • In "Obedient", the boy takes the teacher's instruction to stand in the corner to the extreme, remaining obediently in the same spot for forty years.
  • In "Three O'Clock", a man accepts a job as a bell ringer but misunderstands the task and becomes the clapper instead of pulling the rope.
  • In "Web-Foot Woe", the goose assumes that people are referring to its physical appearance when they yell "Duck," rather than understanding the intended warning about the arrow being shot at it.
• Live Mink Coat: In "Warmhearted", animal activist Beatrice Bright wears a fox around her neck, which the narrator says is actually a living fox and not a faux fur garment.
• Long List: The poem "No" is a really long list of things that people aren't allowed to do in public. The last three things on the list are "No boom box blasters, no trash leavers, no frisbee heavers" — cut to a beaver gnawing the signpost and saying, "Hey, it didn't say no beavers."
• Major Injury Underreaction: In "Advice", William Tell tries to shoot an apple off his son's head, but misses and hits the boy's forehead by mistake. With the arrow struck right through his brain, the boy says "Oh well, you just missed it by a little."
• Malaproper: In "Bituminous?", the narrator struggles with remembering the correct meanings of various words and often substitutes similar-sounding words with different meanings.
• Minor Flaw, Major Breakup: A platonic example in "Long-Leg Lou and Short-Leg Sue," where Long-Leg Lou decides to stop walking with Short-Leg Sue because she can't walk as fast as he can.
• Monster Mash:
  • "Rotten Convention" describes a convention where various gruesome and monstrous characters gather.
  • In "Settin' Around", a boy sits around a campfire with a werewolf, a ghoul, and a vampire, creating a gathering of different types of monsters or supernatural beings.
• Mood Whiplash: "Camp Wonderful" juxtaposes the descriptions of the titular camp as sunny, cool, green, and made by angels with the child's negative anticipation and expectation of hating it.
• Mundane Made Awesome:
  • "Alphabalance" elevates the act of balancing the alphabet to an impressive and time-consuming feat, making it seem more significant and challenging than it would typically be.
  • "Cereal" humorously elevates the description of different types of breakfast cereal, emphasizing their characteristics and behaviors in an exaggerated manner.
  • "Foot Repair" describes the cobbler's actions in repairing the boy's shoes, highlighting the intricacy and skill involved in the process.
  • "Golden Goose" emphasizes the difficulty and impracticality of cooking a golden egg, highlighting the absurdity of the situation.
  • "My Nose Garden" describes a garden full of noses instead of flowers, treating them as valuable and significant.
  • In "Shoe Talk", a boy finds companionship and conversation in his shoe, despite it being an ordinary object.
• Mundane Utility:
  • The poem "Allison Beals and Her 25 Eels" humorously depicts how Allison uses her pet eels for everyday tasks and objects, such as skateboard wheels, hula hoops, soup stirrers, sneaker laces, and more.
  • In "Long Scarf", the protagonist uses a long scarf to keep his chopped-off head in place.
• MacGyvering: In "We're Out of Paint, So...", the painter improvises and uses juices from various foods to create a painting when he runs out of paint.
• Neat Freak: The poem "Clean Gene" describes a boy who likes to keep clean all the time and constantly protects himself from germs.
• Noisy Nature: "Noise Day" celebrates a holiday where children can make all kinds of loud noises, from screaming and hollering to buzzing buzzers and banging pans.
• Noodle Incident: "My Nose Garden" presents a situation where the narrator has a garden full of noses instead of flowers, without providing a clear explanation or backstory for why this is the case.
• Not a Mask: The poem "Best Mask?" is a rare example where the narrator wins first place in an ugly mask contest, even though it's his real face.
• Off with His Head!: In the poem "Long Scarf", when a man is asked to take off his extremely long scarf that's wrapped around his neck, he explains he cannot do so as it's the only thing keeping his head in place after it was chopped off by a villain he was fighting.
• The One Thing I Don't Hate About You: "A Closet Full of Shoes" focuses on the girl's search for the missing shoe that matches the one she is wearing, suggesting an attachment or fondness for that particular item.
• Opposites Attract: "Long-Leg Lou and Short-Leg Sue" initially portrays the friendship between the enormously tall Long-Leg Lou and the very tiny Short-Leg Sue, who have contrasting physical attributes and walking speeds.
• Paralysis by Analysis: "Diving Board" portrays a boy overthinking and scrutinizing every detail of the diving board, becoming so caught up in preparation that he never takes the leap.
• Parental Obliviousness: In "A Cat, a Kid, and a Mom", the child questions why the mother tries to make her wise and patient, suggesting that the mother may not fully understand or empathize with the child's perspective and desires.
• People Zoo: The trope namer. In the poem, a boy is kidnapped and locked up in a zoo where animals can see him instead of the other way around.
• Phony Psychic: In the poem "Crystal Ball," the psychic accurately predicts everything her customer ate for lunch, then admits that she only figured it out by looking at her dress.
• The Power of Friendship: In "Sun Hat", Hannah Hyde's hat becomes a symbol of her friendship and care for the creatures around her.
• Pun:
  • In the poem "The Monkey," several words are replaced with numbers. Many replacements are painfully forced.
  • The poem "Eggs Rated" incorporates multiple egg-related puns throughout the text.
• Punny Name: "The Gnome, the Gnat, and the Gnu" features a play on words with the repeated use of "gn" sounds in the names of the gnome, gnat, and gnu.
• Pyrrhic Victory: Played for laughs in "Big Eating Contest". The narrator wins the eating contest but at a high cost, both financially and in terms of his health.
• The Quiet One: "Noise Day" contrasts with this trope as it describes a special day where children are encouraged to make noise, but on the other days, they are expected to be quiet.
• Reality Is Out to Lunch: "The Castle" presents a castle that defies traditional notions of space and time, suggesting a departure from normal reality and a whimsical, unpredictable environment.
• Reality Is Unrealistic: In "Headphone Harold", Harold's headphones create a distorted perception of the sounds around him, replacing everyday noises with musical instruments.
• Reality Warper: "Falling Up" presents the boy's fall and subsequent journey defying the laws of physics, suggesting the power to manipulate or alter reality.
• Reset Button: "Stork Story" portrays the stork's role in giving elderly people a fresh start by turning them back into babies.
• Rubber Man: In "Reachin' Richard", Richard's arm grows to an unusually long length due to his behavior of reaching across the table instead of asking politely.
• Rule of Three: "A Cat, a Kid, and a Mom" presents three distinct perspectives and voices - the cat, the kid, and the mom - each questioning why the others don't see or understand their own unique identities and behaviors.
• Sadist Teacher: "Crazy Dream" depicts a boy dreaming that he becomes the teacher and his teachers become students. In the dream, the boy gives his transformed teachers outrageous homework assignments and inflicting harsh punishments on them.
• Scare 'Em Straight: "The Toy Eater" uses the threat of the Toy-Eating Tookle to motivate a child to clean up their toys.
• Shut Up, Kirk!: At the end of "Complainin' Jack", the girl finally shuts the jack-in-the-box back in to silence his constant complaints.
• Sore Loser: "Cat Jacks" describes the jaguar cat becoming upset and whining if she loses a game of jacks, suggesting an inability to handle defeat gracefully.
• Sticky Situation: In "Yuck", a boy gets a sticky substance stuck to his shoe and tries to remove it, only to get all his pets and neighbors stuck too.
• Spoiled Brat: The poem "Spoiled Brat" is Exactly What It Says on the Tin, as it portrays a girl who engages in selfish and destructive behavior due to being spoiled.
• The Stinger: The back inside cover has a short handwritten poem telling the reader that they've reached the end and warning them of trying to look for more in the book's binding, lest they vanish within. It is accompanied by an illustration of a pair of legs sticking out of the binding.
• The Stoic:
  • In "Obedient", the boy remains standing in the corner without a whimper or a tear, showing unwavering obedience and emotional restraint, even in the face of summer vacation and the school being closed down.
  • "The Smile Makers" portrays the giant initially frowning and being grumpy. The contrast between his stoic demeanor and the eventual desire to smile highlights the potential for emotional growth and change.
• Take That, Audience!: "Rotten Convention" describes a whole host of gruesome and gross people. It ends with:
  And everybody there kept askin'...
  Where were you?
• Team Spirit: In the poem "Body Language", the body parts are depicted as having their own individual desires and suggestions, but they are ultimately encouraged to work together and reach a collective decision.
• Techno Wizard: "Writer Waiting" describes a boy's excitement over his shiny new computer, which he believes can do everything and help him write a book.
• Tempting Fate:
  • In the poem "Cookwitch Sandwich," the kid tells Katrina the witch cook to make him a sandwich. Insert predictable punchline here.
  • In "Ooh!", the child, despite having a positive and safe experience with the other animals, decides to pet the tiger, which ultimately leads to his fingers getting bitten off.
  • In "Little Pig's Treat", a piglet asks his father to go into the candy shop, potentially setting up a situation where he may not be able to resist indulging in his desires.
  • In "Mirror Mirror", the Evil Queen contemplates what would happen if she let the Magic Mirror fall, causing the mirror to quickly change its answer to flatter her.
  • In "My Sneaky Cousin", a girl sneaks into a washing machine, hoping to get a free bath, but ends up being cleaned in an unexpected and possibly unpleasant way.
  • In "Shanna in the Sauna", one person tries to invite another into the sauna by mentioning various animals present, only to have the situation escalate and become more undesirable.
  • In "Tongue Sticker-Outer", a young boy sticks his tongue out so far that it reaches a star in the sky, resulting in it getting burned.
• Training from Hell: The poem "The Runners". The illustration shows the track team being chased by the coach, who is a lion, over a spiked pit trap.
• Turtle Island: "Hungry Kid Island" appears to be a regular-looking island, but underneath is a giant child who apparently eats humans.
• Unreliable Narrator:
  • In "Imagining", the narrator reassures the girl that there is no mouse in her hair, but fails to mention the presence of an elephant instead.
  • In "Long Scarf", the protagonist tells a fantastical story about his chopped-off head being kept in place by a very long scarf.
• Up, Up and Away!: "Falling Up" depicts the boy's ascent into the sky, surpassing various landmarks and reaching great heights.
• Villain Team-Up: In "Rotten Convention", various villains, such as Killin' Dillon and the Deadly Bore, gather at the convention to share bad tales and interact with one another.
• Was It Really Worth It?: Played for laughs in "Big Eating Contest". The narrator has to pay $2 for the entrance fee, $20 for the burgers and fries, and then $110 for the resulting hospital bill. He wins first prize...which is $5.
• Weight Woe: In "Scale", an overweight man expresses his desire to see the scale and discover that he has lost any weight, but his enormous stomach keeps him from seeing the scale.
• When I Was Your Age...: Amply demonstrated in the poem of the same name. Parodied when the narrator says he's nine and a half, and his uncle scoffs, "When I was your age, I was ten."
• With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility: "Reachin' Richard" contrasts with this trope, as Richard, despite his extraordinary arm length, continues to use it for reaching instead of learning to ask politely or respecting his parents' teachings.

---

The end of the book—
No use to look
For any more, my dear,
'Cause if you try finding
Some more in the binding,
You may just...disappear

Bye-bye
S.S.
— A poem on the back inside cover