The Ring Around
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When the Bubonic Plague overtook Europe years ago,the dead bodies needed to be cremated because 60% of the population was affected! One symptom of the plague was a rosy colored rash that appeared as a ring on the skin. That is where the first line of the nursery rhyme comes from. Posies were the sweet smelling herbs that folks carried in their pockets to fight the terrible smell of the disease, which they superstitiously believed was carried by bad smell. Today children sing this little nursery rhyme while holding hands in a ring and then falling down at the end of it. I know as a child I had no idea of this little song's origin.
A funny anecdote about my daughter. When she was very young, she had a speech problem and had difficulty pronouncing many sounds. On the public bus one day she was chanting loudly: ASSES ASSES. I was horrified and made her be quiet. Later that week I saw her twirling outside and falling down as she said those words. I then realized she had been trying to say Ashes Ashes!
*“Ring around the Rosy. A pocketful of posies.
Ashes, Ashes, we all fall down.” - a nursery rhyme
Gone to ashes.
Each town was a burial ground
gone to ashes.
Multitudes wore rosy rashes;
The Black Death’s ring was on them found.
Dead bodies smoldered all around. . . .
gone to ashes.
Now children chant
“Ashes, ashes,” while in a ring.
Now children chant
and they’re strangely exuberant!
Of pockets of posies they sing
and think not of one deathly thing!
Now children chant.
Written by Andrea Dietrich/ Feb. 16, 2012
and inspired by nette onclaud's
ALPHABETS OF RONDELET Poetry Contest
(I chose Ashes, but also Chant was used
in verse two).
*Please click on "about this poem" to see
the origin of the nursery rhyme it discusses.
Copyright © Andrea Dietrich | Year Posted 2012
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