Where you learn what hippos do under water!

Mr Hippopotamus would never dance a jig,
because he had a feeling that his bottom was too big:
‘How can I jiggle my behind when all the people stare -
and matters aren’t improved at all with frilly underwear!’

Now Mrs Hippopotamus just didn’t care or mind
about the size of her enormous, bouncing, bare behind;
She’d shake her bottom all alone around the dance room floor,
without a care about the stare, from people, one and all.

She’d wriggle left and wriggle right and spin and shake a toe -
(and from a Hippopotamus, believe me, that’s some show!)
But after she had had her fun she’d often give a moan,
for she was always slightly sad that she had danced alone.

‘I wish,’ said Mrs Hippo, ‘That my husband would feel free
to bounce upon the dance room floor and shake his bum with me;
Perhaps if he was out of sight, he might then dare to saunter -
would he feel free, to come with me, if we danced underwater?!’

Now Mr Hippopotamus thought this a great idea,
that out of sight, and underwater, he could shake his rear:
‘But first we need an orchestra, and then a music score -
or else there will be silence on our watered dance room floor.’

They chose a site for their delight beneath an old lagoon,
and Handel’s Water Music seemed to be the perfect tune!
And fish that sang like Angels took the coral singing parts -
conducting was an Octopus, whose nickname was Mozart!

The strings were played by Fiddler Crabs, who used their claws as bows -
a Top C- weed awarded to the best one in the shows!
(And here’s a fact, of interest, that only grown-ups know -
the underwater creatures play a scale from H to O!).

As Mozart’s waving tentacles made Muddy Waters flow
the Drummer Fish and Trumpeters began to bang and blow;
And Mr Hippo and his wife danced freely but unseen,
by all the other animals on land, where they had been.

And that is why if you drift by, you’ll see the hippos bathe,
but though their heads are very still, their bottoms rant and rave;
For on the silty river bed, their feet dance on the sand,
though they will never show their steps if someone is on hand.

But on the very darkest nights, assisted by the moon,
if you’re on hand, upon dry land, you might well witness soon,
A pair of happy hippos bouncing there upon the beach,
and bumping both their bottoms as they’re dancing cheek to cheek!