Send me your ships, your schooners,

and my rocks and reefs will take them.

Send me some seven hundred,

and howling wrecks I will make them.

Give me stormy nights and surging tides,

give me captains who lack in skill,

and I will show you shipwrecks

that no other coastline will.

Teacher’s note: On a sunny day, the coast appears calm and safe. But Victoria’s treacherous, storm-tossed 130-kilometre Shipwreck Coast, from Cape Otway to Port Fairy, has claimed around 700 vessels.

Have you heard the story of Montague Shoe?

He fitted a left foot — ’twas all he could do.

But the shoe that fitted the right foot was lost,

So into the trash can poor Monty was tossed.

But there in the trash Montague found

A shoe for a right foot — ’twas perfectly sound.

They became a new pair, one black and one blue,

And that was the story of Montague Shoe.

I took off a sock

and got a shock —

my toes had all turned green.

I took off the other,

and what a bother —

there wasn’t a toe to be seen!

Whenever people pull out the plug,

The water leaves me behind.

I’m a hideous black circle

of the slimy sticky kind.

An extra yucky bath ring

is grottiness at its worst.

If you wish to avoid this problem,

have a shower first.

The octopossum lives by the sea;

no marine creature’s stranger than he!

A bushy tail with eight long arms,

and one big eye to complete his charms.

Even mighty whales avoid this beast;

they take one look and head nor’-nor’-east.

No shark swims near the octo-p.,

for fear the latter eats it for tea.

The octopossum can be gentle,

but one thing always drives him mental:

to avoid his rage and his grief,

we must save the Great Barrier Reef!

Have you seen the big green elephant?

It’s very, very large!

It hides in the big green jungle,

Which acts as camouflage.

Now if you cannot see it,

Maybe it isn’t there.

Or maybe it’s climbed a tree,

Or flown off in the air.

A tribute to the convicts who built Australia’s colonial architecture

arrowed men

flogged to the bone,

in chains

in gangs

crafted stone.

England’s green

is lost and gone,

harsh light

stiff whips —

labour on.

Some set free

some laid to rest,

unmarked

unmourned

dispossessed.

See their works

and honour them,

the gifts of those

arrowed men.

Our garbage man comes once a week

To empty out our bin.

He takes away everything

That Mum and Dad put in.

I wonder if he looks inside

And smells our stinky cheese,

‘Cause all the food that has expired

Would travel on the breeze.

No wonder he speeds off each week,

He doesn’t hang around.

With so much putrid garbage,

His wheels don’t touch the ground.

Ho, ho! I’m covered in grot,

You can’t see if I’m me or not.

Ho, ho! So much grot,

Am I nice or am I not?

I went to build a house

So I started with the roof.

Tiles or thatch, I wondered,

Which is more fireproof?

Soon the roof was finished,

So I started on the walls.

I fitted all the windows,

Added two nice halls.

Next I build the floor,

‘Twas the smartest house in town,

Except for one small detail:

It was upside down.