After reading Shel Silverstein's poem "Whatif", one of my 12-year-old ESL students wrote this poem.  I thought it was so cute!

Yesterday, when I was sitting at home
I discovered I was all alone
I was reading a fairytale about a king
when suddenly I started thinking
Thinking about all the "why do" questions
I have inside my mind.

Why do I have a cat?
Why can't I buy a hat?
Why do tests take so long?
Why do I have a favourite song?
Why do I have to go to school
when it doesn't even have a pool?
Why do I have to feel this pain at my chest
every time we have a test?
Why do I have to answer now
when I don't know how?

Everything is fine and then
I start to think again.

- Theodora G.