TICKLE IMPS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 122, 25 May 1935, Page 2 (Supplement)

TICKLE IMPS.

(By Anna Chrietensen, 250, Botanical Road, Palmerston .North; age 17)

Their eyes are little drops of lau«hte r and the corners of their mouths" turn up to match their ti'tcd noses. Silver and gold and gleaming are their jacketsuits, though sometimes one, a little gayer even than the vest, flies out in glowing red. I love them eo—my little tickle imps Provocative and whimsical they are' tickling to life the dimples I didn't know I had, turning the droop of corners of my mouth upside-down, and the right-way-up, and tipping up my nose in a fimile. "Come with Uβ," I hear them call, Jn voices like broken bits of laughter. "Come with us, oh litilo one, and forget that life was ever dreary. Come with us— ihe children of Laughter and Bun." "Oh, tickle imps," 1 softly answer, "I cannot say 'No' when you call. I weary of work and must play. . . , M They tumble over one another with eagerness, and little hands tickle mine as they draw me from shadow to sunlight. Little imps Hash brightly here and there. And then the whole world is different. A tiny mauve butterfly flutters by. The imps all whisper: "See, little one, a butterfly to others, a fairy to you." They tickle my fancy and I see and laugh ae they do. A scrap of sunlight gleams on a leaf. "A passing fairy," they say. The thistledown that floats past in a lazy drift of silver is a fleet of fairy boats. My tickle imps tell me so. I walk along the road. My spirits skip. "Your feet should skip and match your spirits," say my imps, and I .skip as I go. "You were stodgy whfin you went along here yesterday, , " my imps reprove. "When your hat blew off you did not see ' the fun* of it. You blushed and were annoyed." "Wo make you rich," say my tickle imps, "and put gold sovereigns of humour in your pocket. You can easily let passers by have a smile at your expense. "There is a tickle of fun and fancy in everything," my imps murmur, "even in email things like ne. If you cannot see a. moon of laughter you can see the stars." "I understand, tickle imps," I say. "But work is waiting. I shall spank you if you lure me away any more." "We lure you back," they say together, "and tickle laughter into your ta<;k. It will not be dull with us for company." So my tickle imps are near, when I work or play, and life is a tickling song