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News > Alumni > POETRY CORNER: ODE TO A GROWN-UP CHILD

POETRY CORNER: ODE TO A GROWN-UP CHILD

Joachim Stanley's (1992, English) poem for a grown-up Alice Liddell started out in life as “Hush, hush, whisper who dares, Christopher Robin is saying his prayers” before taking a 'smoky' turn...
4 Nov 2025
Alumni
Alice Liddell as The Beggar Maid. Albumen silver print, 1858.
Alice Liddell as The Beggar Maid. Albumen silver print, 1858.

Hush, plush

Smoke wreathes the stars,

For Alice is smoking

Delicious cigars.

 

At breakfast it’s Hoyos,

At tea a Fuente

And still Alice muses  

In smoke rings aplenty

 

Some pop up the chimney,

Some lurk in the grate,

Some circle her hat brim

And some fly in state.

 

Each smoke ring’s a pathway,

A memory travelled,

Dimensions distorted

And logic unravelled

 

As Alice floats back

To a boat in the mist

Where a rabbit’s perpetually

Late for some tryst.

 

So hush, hush

As smoke wreathes the stars,

And Alice reflects

On delicious cigars.

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