Dear Readers, because one day’s worth of Benjamin Zephaniah isn’t enough, I thought that today I’d share one of his (many) nature poems. More widely known as an activist, commentator and all-round wonderful human, in 2021 he published a book called ‘Nature Trail‘, which begs to be read aloud, preferably to a group of small children. But somehow, he manages to sneak a more profound message into even to the lightest of poems. Have a look at the last lines of this one. I couldn’t agree more.

Nature Trail

At the bottom of my garden
There’s a hedgehog and a frog
And a lot of creepy-crawlies
Living underneath a log,
There’s a baby daddy long legs
And an easy-going snail
And a family of woodlice,
All are on my nature trail.

There are caterpillars waiting
For their time to come to fly,
There are worms turning the earth over
As ladybirds fly by,
Birds will visit, cats will visit
But they always chose their time
And I’ve even seen a fox visit
This wild garden of mine.

Squirrels come to nick my nuts
And busy bees come buzzing
And when the night time comes
Sometimes some dragonflies come humming,
My garden mice are very shy
And I’ve seen bats that growl
And in my garden I have seen
A very wise old owl.

My garden is a lively place
There’s always something happening,
There’s this constant search for food
And then there’s all that flowering,
When you have a garden
You will never be alone
And I believe we all deserve
A garden of our own.

Benjamin Zephaniah Friday, January 3, 2003