Writing persona poems in the voices of animals is always one of my favorite workshops not just because the students all have personal and interesting relationships with animals but also because the personas can sometimes reveal a surprising amount about the students themselves.
Mrs. Taylor
8th Grade, 1st Period
a poem written by a squirrel
Skyler L.
i need to get fat
this oak is too small
where will i store my food
i am a squirrel
i collect nuts, berries, and other
random human foods to eat
the girl in the big box is afraid
of me
so i chase her
a lot
poor human
i almost got hit by a moving box once
it was scary
the two suns blinded me as i
crossed the solid black lake
but i made it across to my oak
yay
but where will i sleep for the winter
my oak is too full and can’t fit me
i will have to sleep in the pear tree
in the little human’s yard
and chase her when spring comes
A poem written by an Alpaca
Mia W.
I’m tired of being mistaken for a llama
can they not see the length of my neck?
can no one feel my coarse thick pelt?
I’m hungry, I think I’ll pace in circles awaiting my meal
The dried corn gets stuck in my teeth, do they notice?
I have hay stuck in my fur, I really hope I stink.
I wish they would put these silver flashing things away.
Why are they pointed at me? I’ll trot behind a hay stack.
I’m hungry, will they leave me to starve?
Back to pacing. I have to pee. I think I just
stepped in it.
a poem written by a hedgehog
Shannon C.
let me go roll up in a ball
why is this human poking me
no I’m not dead
what if I could shoot spikes like a porcupine
a human saw me today and started squealing so I hid
what if I rolled up and never came back out
I escaped my cage but my owner caught me
sometimes I want people to just leave me alone
no I’m not that cute
stop petting me stop poking me
I curl up into a ball and I feel trapped.
Mrs. Dollear
8th Grade, 3rd Period
A poem written by a hippo
Kaiden B.
Large and bulking
big and hulking
hefty and lurking
in my home.
Can’t fit through the door
Do I need to squeeze more?
If I do they’ll adore
me in my home.
The zoo is my home
hate the big glass dome
They laugh and I loathe
I hate this home.
A poem written by a turtle
Samantha L.
You don’t like me
You never feed me
You never take me outside
You never show me that you love me
You never clean my tank
You never clean my shell
You never say hi
You never say goodbye
Poem from A Piglet
Sebastian M.
ONK, ONK, ONK,
I Am a pig!
Well not yet,
But soon.
People misjudge me,
because I roll in the mud,
People think I’m lesser
because I eat their scraps
I Could be like Them!
Pigs are quite smart,
pigs can be as humans, as
humans could be pigs,
we are just as smart
and just as capable!
now if u excuse m,
I am gonna roll in
filth…
Mrs. Taylor
8th Grade, 6th Period
Poem Written by a Blobfish
Edina H.
i sit at the bottom of the ocean
it is warm here
i like it here, by the underwater volcanoes
i slowly float around
i is bob
bob da blobfish
my home is, somewhere
idk where tbh
i floated away from it a while ago
cause that’s what blobfish do
float
not much else
nothing really goes on up in my head
cause im not really good at thinkin’
but that’s ok
cause being a blobfish
don’t need no thinkin’.
A poem written by a Sloth
Gabriel G.
Lol 1v1 irl mate
I will rek you
just as soon as I get down
from this tree.
It will take eight hours. But when I do… you will die.
I have da best life
Yes, I know, I’m slow.
but luckily my friend Jerry
gives me rides to the drinking
pond every day. He is a snail.
As I ride him, I feel the
wind blowing into my face.
I pretend I am da most mig race car driver in da business
So fast… So fast…
Uh oh I forgot my fedora back at
my crib. All right mates I
will be back in 2 days.
a poem written by a jellyfish
Kaarina J.
why am I so floppy
I want to meet a peanutbutter fish
why is the ocean so dark
my cousins light up I wish I could
I don’t know where I’m going
Dave and I look the same
so do Riley and I; this
is like something from the Matrix
I’m going to go zap some fish
it’ll be just like finding Nemo
who is Nemo wait what am I doing
why is it so dark I can’t see
my cousins light up wait what am
I doing where’s my mom
what’s up there is that a
light woah dude this is trippy
it’s cold I’m leaving why am
I so floppy do I have a brain
where is it all I see is a blob
how do I see I don’t have eyes
where am I going who am I
maybe I’m Riley or Dave they look
like me why am I so floppy
Mrs. Taylor
8th Grade, 7th Period
a poem written by a male seahorse
Hope S.
I wake up every morning wondering
where the hell are my feet
why am I in a glass box
what are these freakishly large animals walking
past me and pointing their finger at me
I wonder why I’m pregnant
I wonder why it smells like fish all the time
or why every day and night
food magically falls from the sky
and I’m still wondering why I look like a horse
but I don’t have feet?
and why can’t I get out of this box.
A poem written by a whale, by Whalebur the Whale
Claudia B.
Where did all the small sea animals go?
I’m a good whale, polite and definitely not intimidating!
Oh whale! Anyways, I have much bigger issues.
Humans no longer admire me! It’s all about those
whales with a unicorn horn!! No.
How can you go wrong with a 2 ton mammal?
To top it all off, I can spray water, that’s cool right?
Now I’m hungry! Might as well find those plankton from earlier.
A Poem Written by a Rabbit
Nicole S.
People think I’m stupid and I smell
and that makes me sad
I am not stupid
I know what time my dinner will be served
I also know how to get my human’s attention without making a sound
I sometimes wonder how it would be to be free
to hop through the grass and dig in the dirt
but I will never know freedom
I can hop around the house but not outside
They say the outside is cold and dangerous
but maybe it’s not I don’t know that
sometimes I observe what the humans do and I follow them
I never watch where I’m going so once in a while
I will get kicked or stepped on, the humans feel bad then
I have eaten so many things from books to live wires
yet I manage to stay alive
I feel very lucky but I don’t know if I really am.
