Once Upon a Time
by Valentina Gratton
Once upon a time
Far from any shore
There was a big castle
On the ocean floor.
And in the castle
Lived hermit crabs
Who were always cheerful
And rarely sad.
Then one day
A turtle swam by
As blind as a bat
He had sand in his eye.
He crashed in the highest
Tower of the castle
One by one they fell down.
What a disaster!
The towers fell
On the hermit crabs
Trapping their shells
Beneath the sand.
So the hermit crabs
Abandoned their shells
And they ran away
To save themselves.
After some time
The shells turned to sand
And over the years
It washed to the land.
One hot summer day
Two girls came to play
With buckets and rakes
In the sand washed away.
They worked long and hard
For 10 hours straight
They built the most beautiful
Sand-castle made.
That night, a hermit crab
After a long day of swimming
Came to shore
And saw the great castle
gleaming.
He rushed to the ocean
Describing with glee
The most beautiful castle
Of land and of sea.
And crabs crawled
From every crack in the earth
To see if the news
Had any worth.
One by one they crept
Into the spectacular castle.
They felt a great sense of magic
As if under a spell.
They felt as though something
From a long time ago
Was here, all around
Surrounding them so.
And in the middle
Of all the celebration
Happiness and joy
They realized something
They thought was gone
Was not completely destroyed.
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