Theme Thursday - Shadow

Jessie Wilcox-Smith

Although this poem is not my own, it has special meaning to me. As a child I had a book called Gateway to Storyland (edited by Watty Piper). It contained stories like The Gingerbread Boy, Peter Rabbit and the Three Little Kittens. My Shadow was also included. I learned to read from that book. I remember the day clearly when it all came together for me.

Here's Robert Louis Stevenson's My Shadow originally from The Child's Garden of Verses.

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.

The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow--
Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;
For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,
And he sometimes goes so little that there's none of him at all.

He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.
He stays so close behind me, he's a coward you can see;
I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!

One morning, very early, before the sun was up,
I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;
But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head,
Had stayed at home
behind me and was fast asleep in bed.

--Robert Louis Stevenson