The Candy Smash by Jacqueline Davies Read Free Book Online

math.
    "Poetry?" said Mrs. Feeney, raising her eyebrows. "Well, I don't know anything about poetry."
    "It's okay," said Megan. "We'll teach you."
    The class moved, fairly quietly, to the rug area and sat on the floor.
    After Morning Meeting, Salley turned the page on the easel to reveal the Poem of the Day. Mrs. Feeney called on Ray to read the poem out loud.
    Â 
T OAD
by Valerie Worth
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When the flowers
Turned clever, and
Earned wide
Tender red petals
For themselves,
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When the birds
Learned about feathers,
Spread green tails,
Grew cockades
On their heads,
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The toad said:
Someone has got
To remember
The mud, and
I'm not proud.
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    There was silence. Mrs. Overton had taught them to let a poem sink in before talking about it. But Mrs. Feeney didn't know about that, so she was the first to comment. "You see. That's what I mean. It doesn't make any sense to me. I'm just not a poetry person."
    Well, Jessie wasn't a poetry person, either, but she thought it was pretty weak of Mrs. Feeney to just give up without even trying. She looked at Evan. He was reading the poem again to himself, his lips moving silently, shaping the strange words.
    Megan raised her hand. "The flowers are kind of selfish," she said. "They're just thinking about themselves."
    "What's a cockade?" asked Christopher.
    "I have no idea," said Mrs. Feeney. She didn't move from her seat.
    "We have a dictionary, you know," said Jessie.
    "Well, feel free to look it up, if you want," said Mrs. Feeney.
    Jessie stood up, exasperated, as Evan raised his hand and asked, "Why does someone have to remember the mud?" Jessie noticed he wasn't directing his question at Mrs. Feeney. He was looking at the other kids in 4-O.
    Salley answered. "Because mud is one of the things you take for granted. No one bothers to
remember
it. But it's important. At least to a toad."
    "Toads love mud!" said Malik.
    "Hey, it's a love poem!" said Tessa. "A love poem for mud." And instead of laughing, the kids in 4-O nodded their heads and agreed. It turns out you could even write a love poem about mud.
    "A cockade is a fancy thing you wear on your hat to show that you're better than everyone else," said Jessie, her finger still marking the spot in the dictionary—the
grown-up
dictionary—that Mrs. Overton kept on the shelf beside her desk. "It's a sign of rank." She looked particularly at Mrs. Feeney, but Mrs. Feeney didn't seem to be listening. She had her eye on the clock.
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    At recess, Jessie carried the box of surveys with her to the playground and guarded it safely. Three more days until Valentine's Day. Tomorrow, Saturday, and Sunday. Only three days to calculate the results of the survey and write her article. Kids kept wandering over to her on the playground. It was as if they were ants drawn to a big sticky spot of spilled lemonade on the sidewalk. They couldn't keep away.
    But as soon as the class went back inside, they forgot all about the surveys. There was something much more interesting on their desks: more candy hearts! And the messages on these were just as personal as the other ones.
    "Mine says SMART GUY ," said David, waving his box in the air.
    "Hey, look!" said Taffy Morgan. "Mine says TWINKLE TOES ," and she held up one foot to show the glittery shoes she was wearing that day.
    Jessie's hearts said GO-GETTER on them. It was as if the hearts were telling her to spring into action now that there was something to investigate!
    Obviously, Mrs. Overton hadn't put these candy hearts on their desks. So who had? Jessie whipped out her reporter's notebook and began to write down the names of everyone in the classroom and the messages on their hearts. As she made her list, she wondered:
Will there be more hearts tomorrow?

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    Mrs. Feeney didn't know the new rule about no candy in the classroom, but she did know her old rule about no noise in the classroom, and she promptly threatened to send all of them to the principal's office if they didn't "pipe down