A Big, Fat Potato Lyrics
A lazy potato falls asleep in the garden and dreams he is king: radishes dance, cucumbers sing and pumpkins get painted blue. Then a mole wakes him up.
A Big, Fat Potato
A big, fat potato lay down on a clod
In the shade of some burdock and tall goldenrod,
And he dreamed he were king of the whole garden plot,
With a palace and throne, and a crown with a lot
Of jewels and diamonds and gold till it shone
Like the front of a show when the lights are turned on.
He had to be minded by all of the plants;
When he whistled the radishes knew they must dance;
When he tooted his horn the cucumbers must sing
To a vegetable crowd gathered round in a ring.
He made all the cabbages stand in a row
While a sunflower instructed them just how to grow;
The bright yellow pumpkins he painted light blue;
Took the clothes off the scare-crow and made him buy new.
He strutted and sputtered and thought it was grand
To be king and commander o'er all the wide land.
But at last he woke up with an awful surprise
And found a blind mole kicking sand in his eyes.
Printed from https://nurseryrhymes.co/a-big-fat-potato/
- Type
- Mother Goose
- Tune
- Spoken poem
- Best for ages
- 4 to 9 years
What Does A Big, Fat Potato Mean?
The potato dreams of being a king, bossing the whole vegetable garden around. He makes the radishes dance, the cucumbers sing and the cabbages line up, paints the pumpkins blue and even makes the scarecrow buy new clothes. A clod is a lump of earth, and burdock and goldenrod are wild plants. The dream ends with a mole kicking sand in his eyes.
History and Origin
The poem comes from The Peter Patter Book of Nursery Rhymes (1918) by the American writer Leroy F. Jackson. It belongs to a long tradition of nursery verse in which vegetables and animals behave like people.
Learning Activities
- Vegetable kingdom: line up real vegetables and give each a job, like the potato king.
- Draw the dream: draw the dancing radishes and the blue pumpkins.
- Garden visit: look for a mole hill, and talk about how moles dig.