Take One Home for the Kiddies

On shallow straw, in shadeless glass,

Huddled by empty bowls, they sleep:

No dark, no dam, no earth, no grass -

Mam, get us one of them to keep.

Living toys are something novel,

But it soon wears off somehow.

Fetch the shoebox, fetch the shovel -

Mam, we're playing funerals now.

Philip Larkin