By Julie

Short, twisted, knobbly,
Perfect little plants
Providing shade to tiny chipmunks
On a hot day

Perfect topiary
That twists itself in knots
Tiny dwarf trees
Shading the butterflies

To solve the code, go forward one letter in the alphabet. They will spell out a secret message! If you get confused, use the letter cheat sheet at the bottom of the message. Don’t look at the secret answer until you’ve solved the message.

RGD RFKKR RFZ-RGDKKR NM SGD RDZ RGNQF.

Z=A ~ A=B ~ B=C ~ C=D ~ D=E ~ E=F ~ F=G ~ G=H ~ H=I ~
I=J ~ J=K ~ K=L ~ L=M ~ M=N ~ N=O ~ O=P ~ P=Q ~ Q=R ~
R=S ~ S=T ~ T=U ~ U=V ~ V=W ~ W=X ~ X=Y ~ Y=Z

THE SECRET ANSWER:
She sells sea-shells on the sea shore.

Penguins, penguins, everywhere!
Floating in the water
White bellies blending in
Invisable from above,
Or diving,
streaking
through the water like black and white torpedoes,
Turning loops underwater
Chaos
and
Pandemonium
Everywhere!
Cold slippery ice floes
and icebergs
are occupied
by many resting penguins
that are scrambling on
and diving off
all the time.
But after
a
long
time,
when the sky shines bright with stars,
the penguins scramble
Onto the snowy banks
Until there is just one left.
One little white belly
Against millions of gleaming stars
And the millions of waves
That make up the sea.

If the world was crazy
I’d wear a sweater full of trolls,
And drink a pint of toothpaste,
I’d walk upside down and walk a caterpillar,
I’f turn a cartwheel on a pond
And smell a budding lampshade
And build of house of daisies,
But only if
The world was crazy.

Thursday Afternoon
Bongo drums beat
And a creek gurgles
In the distance
As two feet drum along
The carpet
To the bookshelf
A book as thick as
A loaf of bread
Is chosen
And into the chair,
The one shaped like
A butterfly,
It is set
To read
On a Thursday afternoon.

Fog creeps down
Pacing throughout the town on snow leopard feet,
Sinking lower and lower
Until the town is engulfed, drowning in dense fog
And the leopard pounces,
Fog lifting and pouncing to the next town,
Leaving
As mysteriously
As it had come.