I saw a Peacock with a fiery tail
I saw a blazing comet drop down hail
I saw a Cloud with Ivy circled round
I saw a sturdy Oak creep on the ground
I saw a Pismire swallow up a whale
I saw a raging Sea brim full of Ale
I saw a Venice Glass sixteen foot deep
I saw a Well full of men`s tears that weep
I saw their eyes all in a flame of fire
I saw a House as big as the Moon and higher
I saw the sun even in the midst of night
I saw the Man that saw this wonderous sight.
The pictures are from the wondrous I Saw a Peacock with a Fiery Tail by Gond tribal artist Ramsingh Urveti and book designer Jonathan Yamakami.
What they don’t show you here is the die cutting that lets you see through from one line to the next in exactly the playful way the poem hides and shows itself. This in itself is an achievement. It takes Eric Carle’s idea of putting holes in a picture book a step further, to creatively reproduce the trick of the poem in visual form. It’s worth reading Yamakami’s blog post describing the process he went through to get to this point.
Are you looking for a beautiful Christmas present to give someone? Try Tara Books’ amazing handmade volumes. The fantastic brainpickings.org (it’s all superlatives today) introduced me to I Like Cats and The Night Life of Trees.
You can get both books on amazon, but I imagine they won’t last for ever because they are handmade:
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