For T & B (or M)
I can tell by your smile it’s a story you seek
And I think I’ve got the best story this week.
I’m Wizardini and I’m from Ideale,
A far away land that’s quite simply unreal.
This story’s about a young lady named Teagan, you’ll see
and something quite special found just above her knee.
Have you ever been to a place where everything’s pretty?
The bugs are all cute, as sweet as your teddy,
And everybody’s face has a smile for you all ready.
Ideale as a place is a wonderful thing.
Everybody’s so gorgeous: the bumblebees don’t sting.
Such a gathering of gorgeousness you never saw,
Ideale is in fact prefect, except for one flaw:
It’s almost ideal except for one thing,
Ideale as a place is a kingdom with no king.
No one was quite sure just where the king went
Whether he left or if he was sent.
Some said riches were in his plans,
And he’d taken a fleet to far away lands.
Others whispered about in a quiet buzz,
They all were so pretty…
they forgot who the king was.
One sunny day, I stood before them and said,
“I’ve had a vision of our new leader while I slept in my bed.
A dream told me I would find our new monarch,
Maybe in the field, or in the mall, or maybe in the park.
The one important thing that I would have to remark,
Is that on this person’s person is a special kind of mark.”
“A mark… A MARK! But how could that be?
Our king won’t be perfect, not pretty like me.”
I watched with confusion as they buzzed like a fuse,
How they’d already forgotten my good wizard news.
With my umbrella, my favorite book, and my determined stare,
I set off down the road with only one care.
I would knock on every door and shake every hand,
I would do all I could to speak to all in the land.
I wouldn’t rest
I wouldn’t stop
I wouldn’t even take a meal
Until I found that mark
Until I found that ideal person…
To be the best thing for Ideale.
Soon it felt like ten summers had gone by with no luck
I felt like a wizard with my face in the muck.
I was sure I had met everyone that I could,
But no one had the mark that my dream said they would.
By now I was sure everyone thought I was silly,
And all of Ideale called me an old silly nilly.
I rested my tired face on my hands, on my knees,
And said: “Oh my gosh-goodness, I just wanted to please!”
At that moment a little voice said: “Hello,”
“…You look so sad,
Like there’s no more down you could go.”
“Maybe all you need is water to drink,
We can visit my mom in the house colored pink.
We love to have guests in our home where we stay,
So very few people travel so far this way.”
A big smile rose on my tired old face
Who thought I’d find someone so nice, so far out of place?
“My name’s Teagan,”
“I am Wizardini the Wizard,” I said.
“And meeting a nice person is a weight off my head.”
And to myself, just then I thought:
“My, this as a quality sure means a lot.
In all of my travels throughout this whole quest,
No one else has been nice enough to make me their guest.”
We walked together to the house colored pink,
And got some cold water she poured from the sink
Teagan’s Mommy was nice, and beautiful too,
We three sat and talked from nine until two.
Soon Teagan’s curiosity could no longer hold,
She asked me Wizardini what had left me so cold.
I said: “My dear, I’m on an impossible quest,
A nastier challenge than any math test.
I have to find someone in Ideale,
Someone I’m now sure just can’t be real.
Somewhere in this land there is someone distinct,
Someone more special than lavender ink.
How can there be in this land of perfection,
Someone who stands in a different direction?”
“So what you seek,” Mommy said with a smile
“What’s taken you mile, after mile, after mile…
Is the search for a person who’s not the same as you or me,
Not the same as her, and different than Aunt Bea,
Not the same as the pretty teacher or the handsome spelling bee,
And not the same as every Idealian from here to the Sea?”
“Well, that’s simple,” said Teagan “That person is me.”
“What!” I then said, my mouth drooped to the floor,
I said nothing else, stunned right to the core.
I thought to myself one thing and not a thing more:
“How could pretty young Teagan be the king I’m looking for?”
After a moment right there, on Teagan went
Explaining to me just what she meant.
“We are all different, why can’t you see?
My mommy’s distinct, like you and like me.
Mommy’s always said, since I was as small as a pea,
Being a little bit different is what we were all meant to be.”
I went to sleep with one thought on my mind:
“Should I be seeking a leader of a different kind?”
I fell off to sleep and a vivid, bright dream
About a pretty young girl who could show all of Ideale,
That all the gorgeous people were far more than they seem.
“Why don’t you both come?” I said the next day,
We’ll go tell Ideale, all these things that you say…”
We went into town, all three standing tall
Right through the crowds, to the centre of the mall
“Gather around my friends,” I said to them all.
“Open your ears, for my news is not small.”
They slowly gathered, with their faces wound up tight,
Like they wouldn’t believe me, with all of their might.
“We seek a king for our land of Ideale
But we all seem to forget that ideal is not real.”
“You are you and he is him
Your name is Martha and his is Jim.
His mother is Polly and yours is Kim
I know that you all think of me as quite dim
But the differences among you Idealians
Could fill the school gym.”
“Different? Different? Is that what he said?”
“How could such nasty words escape from your head?”
“If we were all different, then how could it be
That one of us after the next is perfect to a T?
From every lovely head to every pretty knee
There isn’t one flaw that you can see.”
At that moment,
The pretty young girl with the Wizard decided to speak
It was high time that they found a new different to seek.
“Different means more than a mistake or a flaw,
It means distinct and special…
Maybe the best you ever saw.”
“People and things are different for a reason
Where would the year be with only one season?
Who would want all the same snowflake,
One kind of singing voice,
And one flavor of birthday cake?”
Just then Edgar, Ideale’s handsome town grump,
Interrupted her, stomping his foot down with a thump.
“How can we be expected to believe what you say,
When it comes from the prettiest girl we’ve seen all day?
If somewhere on you such difference exists,
I will have to rethink every one of my lists.
Teagan looked over at her mommy, who nodded and said,
“Go ahead, Darling, they all need to see,
How special and different special can be.”
So, now with every eye in all of Ideale looking on,
Teagan gave them a reason to have been gathered since dawn,
Just above her knee she then lifted her skirt,
And every jaw before her dropped right to the dirt.
On the front of her leg sat a big bright strawberry,
And I thought to myself, ‘this is news that’ll carry.’
“That’s it! That’s it! The wizard spoke of that mark.
On the leader we would find in the mall or the park.”
“That’s different? That’s special? Well that’s not so bad!”
“It’s bright and it’s pretty…”
“…It’s something I wish I had!”
Then the NEATEST thing happened, something I never foresaw,
Everyone started to show off their own wonderful flaw.
“I have a mark on my arm.”
“I’m allergic to cats”
“I was born missing a toe!”
“This is not my real hair.”
“I hate taking baths.”
“I can’t play the oboe!”
At that moment old Edgar, the former town grump,
Had just finished showing off his very strange hump,
Like everyone around him he felt knocked up a peg,
So he led his town in a cheer: “To Princess Strawberry-Leg!”
I watched with a smile, arms folded across my chest,
Knowing for sure that this would be best.
But just then my young friend said something I didn’t expect:
She rose up her voice, her arms standing erect.
“My friends and my neighbors I have one thing to suggest
Something I bet you’ll agree and attest.
If Ideale’s leader is someone with a special mark,
We know we’re all different, let’s all be monarch.”
“Stand up and be proud of your special things,
And we’ll all be princes, princesses and kings.”
The people they cheered and the bells they did chime
The Land of Ideale was an even shinier dime.
I said then to her Mommy, “You must be proud all the time.”
She nodded and said,
“And I had no idea how well she can rhyme.”
Things were imperfectly perfect from then on in Ideale,
Once upon a time, happily ever after, and all that... stuff.
The End
