The Dirigible Balloon
Poetry for Children

Self-isolating

Listen to Carole read her poem ...
Why me? Not fair and all because
of where I sit. It makes me cross.

Two whole weeks the teacher said
I count the minutes in my head.

What am I being punished for?
Why can’t I go out the door?

I watch my sisters go to school.
It isn’t fair! It’s wrong! It’s cruel.

And I can’t even ride my bike,
play outside, do what I like.

It’s not as though I’m feeling bad,
I’m fine, just angry, bored and sad.

I was all dressed for Hallowe’en
and now my outfit won’t be seen,

can’t enter the best pumpkin prize
stuck here, alone and ostracised.

I don’t get any sympathy
I know who’ll win and it won’t be me.

Feel like a leper. Unclean! Unclean!
It’s rubbish being in quarantine.

About the Writer


Carole Bromley

Carole was born in Middlesbrough in the UK and lives in York. She has had pamphlets and collections published and has also won a number of competitions, including the Bridport, the Yorkshire Open, Torbay, Poetry Space and the Bronte Society Literary Prize. Her poems for children have been published in The Caterpillar, in her collection, Blast Off! and in anthologies from MacMillan and Emma Press. She was the winner of the 2022 Caterpillar Prize. Carole will be tutoring a course on writing poems for children at the Garsdale Retreat in October 2024