A dirty toad

A muddy road:

Little Rick

Hit it with a stick

The toad turned gold

But Rick grew old;

And now he’s rich

But there was a glitch.

     What’s an old man to do with a toad that’s made of gold? Little Rick, grown old, put it in his pocket and went home to ask his mama what to do. But when his mama saw a small old man wearing her son’s clothes, crusted with dirt from the muddy road, she screamed and called the police.

     Little Rick, though now an old man, was still a child inside and began to cry. His father came down the stairs from a snoring nap, alarmed to see an old man, though tiny, crying on the front porch while his wife was shrieking and police sirens sounded in the distance.

     Rick’s papa, also seeing the old man wearing his only son’s clothes, screamed “what did you do with my son!?”  

     But poor little Rick wailed some more, sputtering “daddy, can’t you see it’s me?” and promptly fell to the floor, unconscious from his papa’s blow.

     The police came and arrested Little Old Rick on suspicion of kidnapping and took in his father for beating the old man who, unknown to him, was his son.

     Rick awoke in his cell, alone—for the town was small and safe and there were no other prisoners. The police were interviewing his father. His mind a swampy mist from aging so quickly and his parents turning cold on him, he reflected on his bad fortune.

     As he thought, he heard a strange sound from his pocket. He reached in and pulled out the golden frog, who was now talking:

Boys who hit with sticks

Become a monster transfixed;

For if you give another pain

Your soul receives a stain.

Once you were a happy boy

Treating living creatures as a toy

But now you’re an old man

Stuck in prison land.

     Little Rick finally understood the frog’s pain, now that he had pain of his own. Tears flowed yet again, a few of them touching the frog.

     When the police came to the cell, ready to interview the crazy old man, they found a little boy in muddy clothes, staring at a green frog in his hands.

Note: Written for today’s dVersePoets prompt, “Maurice Sendak”