The Gardener Lyrics
A child watches the gardener, who talks little, makes the child keep to the gravel walk, and is always busy digging far off in the plots. The last verse looks ahead to winter, when the garden is bare and the gardener must put down his barrow.
The Gardener
The gardener does not love to talk.
He makes me keep the gravel walk;
And when he puts his tools away,
He locks the door and takes the key.
Away behind the currant row,
Where no one else but cook may go,
Far in the plots, I see him dig,
Old and serious, brown and big.
He digs the flowers, green, red, and blue,
Nor wishes to be spoken to.
He digs the flowers and cuts the hay,
And never seems to want to play.
Silly gardener! summer goes,
And winter comes with pinching toes,
When in the garden bare and brown
You must lay your barrow down.
Printed from https://nurseryrhymes.co/the-gardener/
- Type
- Poems for Children
- Written by
- Robert Louis Stevenson
- Tune
- Read in a steady, slightly grumbling voice, like a child telling a tale about a busy grown-up
- Best for ages
- 4 to 9 years
What Does The Gardener Mean?
The poem is a child's report on a grown-up who does not play. The gardener "does not love to talk", makes the child "keep the gravel walk", and locks up the tools with a key. In the second verse he is far off "behind the currant row", digging in his plots, "old and serious, brown and big". Only the cook is allowed so far into the garden, the child says.
Then comes the child's complaint: he digs the flowers and cuts the hay and never seems to want to play. The last verse printed here is in a teasing tone: "Silly gardener! summer goes", and winter arrives with "pinching toes" (very cold feet). The garden will be "bare and brown", and the gardener "must lay your barrow down". A barrow is a wheelbarrow. In the book one more verse follows, not printed here, in which the child tells the gardener it would be wiser to come and play while summer lasts.
Some words: plots are the separate beds in a garden, and currant bushes are the small shrubs that bear red or black berries.
History and Origin
Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh in 1850. He had written Treasure Island (1883) before his children's verse book was published in 1885. Like many poems in that book, it looks at grown-ups from a child's height.
Learning Activities
- Gardener says: play a quiet game where one child is the gardener who may only point, and the others have to guess the job.
- Plots and paths: mark out a small garden plan on paper with beds, a gravel walk and a currant row, and colour it in.
- Winter garden: draw the garden in winter, bare and brown, and compare it with a summer drawing of the same place.
- Toy wagon: load a toy wagon or a box with soft toys and push it across the carpet, like the gardener with his barrow.