Petunia

By Don Roundy, Boot Building Bard

I was yarning about the good ol' days
With my kids one day at dinner
And I told them of the neighbor gal
And her friend. A piglet wiener.
This gal was about your age,
I told my eight year old
Her daddy brought it in a box.
"This one's yours," Renee was told.
"You take and feed him really good
and try to make him fat
on mash and things like melon rinds
and scraps and stuff like that."
Renee was past excited
About her new darlin' pet!
She fed it and tried to teach it tricks.
But that made piggy fret.
She named the grunt Petunia
He grew to be a hog.
For months she perched the pig pen fence.
Why, she gave away her dog!
And in the fall her porky pet
Went to the county fair.
She showed it on a pink rope
With a bow tied in it's hair.
It got a prize and ribbon
For it's body type or style.
Renee felt like the winner
With her big wide toothless smile.
But days later she was a tearing up
And snifflin' like little girls do
As she sat not eating dinner.
Her dad said, "What's wrong with you!
Are you going to eat or going to sniffle?
Don't let this whole thing ruin ya."
So she coughed once, then swallered hard
And said, "Please pass petunia."