The Dirigible Balloon
Poetry for Children

Lenny Loudmouth

Lenny Loudmouth liked to sing while jogging in the park,
but Lenny was a running exclamation mark,
and made the leaves
fall off the trees
with his unmelodic bark.

Lenny Loudmouth went to play for his local football team,
but the manager had to quickly put a stop to Lenny's dream,
for, on the pitch, week after week,
it was clear that Lenny’s ball technique
wasn’t nearly as good as his bawl technique.

Lenny Loudmouth went to work on a nearby farm,
despite his louder-than-a-cockerel voice being bound to cause alarm.
And, sure enough, the farmer had to say no way
to Lenny making bales of hey!
instead of bales of hay.

Lenny Loudmouth liked to busk on the beach,
but his singing voice was worse than a seagull’s screech
which, turning into a huge wail,
had the same effect as a beached whale
in making people suddenly flee that section of the beach.

Lenny Loudmouth became a librarian, despite being in no doubt
that telling people to shhhh would be hard with such a gob.
And, sure enough, each shhhh that came out
turned into a shhhhout
and, clearly, he shhhhouldn’t have taken that job.

Lenny Loudmouth, turning his hand to being a handyman on call,
was asked to paint a wall a shade of yellow.
He used a mix of yell and bellow.
This mix became his loudest scream of all,
which straightaway knocked down the wall.

Lenny Loudmouth decided that was it,
he’d had enough of being loud, having had to admit
that if even his own assaulted ear drums
were now constantly plagued by hisses and hums,
it was time, at last, to do something about it.

Lenny Loudmouth changed his name by deed poll.
Afterwards, he didn’t tell a soul,
and couldn’t, for now that he was known as Marcus Mute,
there was absolutely no dispute
that not a sound could be heard from his cakehole.

About the Writer


Thomas McColl

Thomas lives in London. He's had poems published in magazines such as Prole, Envoi, London Grip, Ink, Sweat & Tears and Lighten Up Online, and has two collections to his name: Being With Me Will Help You Learn (Listen Softly London Press, 2016) and Grenade Genie (Fly on the Wall Press, 2020). He can be contacted via his website: https://thomasmccoll.wordpress.com/