Zoppetto

ABC WEDNESDAY
http://abcwednesday-mrsnesbitt.blogspot.com.au/
another Grand Finale of the Alphabet

ZOPPETTO

Come, my love, and dance with me

To an ancient melody.

Let us do a lively jig

While she plays on a thingummy-jig.

Maybe she will sing falsetto

While we demonstrate zoppetto.

If I seem to limp a bit

That is just the way of it.
That was the way  it was invented;
Limping cannot be prevented.
It gives us a rather curious gait,
Half comical and half sedate.

I hop and limp and limp and hop,

Wishing the thrill would never stop.

You're the neatest dancer yet! Oh!

See us dancing a zoppetto.

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A zoppetto is described as a "medieval Italian limping hop-dance"!

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THROUGH A CHILD'S EYES

A gas-mask, hardly a childhood toy!

But then, most of you weren't there.

Hitler's a creature of history;

The War an old affair.

But I was a child of the Second World War,

Born in 1931,

And I have to say I found gas-masks

Quite a lot of fun!

I remember when they were doled-out,

Some time the previous year,

When Hitler invaded Poland

And made it very clear

That he wanted the whole of Europe

Including the British Isles.

He wanted his soldiers to strut our streets

With their jackboots and 'Sieg Heils'.

When we went to collect our gas-masks

A new design was displayed,

A gas-mask for tiny babies

To be used in case of a raid.

They were called 'Mickey Mouses'

Although I'm sad to say

They didn't look like a mouse at all,

Not in any way.

Oh how I loved my gas-mask,

In it's neat little cardboard box!

(Sorry I simply can't recount

Death or Fear or Shocks!)

Sometimes we'd go for little walks

Wearing our precious masks!

Acting as though light-hearted

Was one of motherhood's tasks.

But best of all were the practices

We had to have in school;

Learning to take them off and on

Was part of the Golden rule.

And then came the really lovely part

For all the girls and boys.

If we blew hard into the mouthpiece

We could all make

A RUDE NOISE!

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