A little mercy

There once was a tadpole named Roz
Who came to school from a yard
He was found by a kid
Who brought him and a lid
And some pond-water, in an old jar.

We welcomed him into the class
And expected his change to come fast
We waited for legs
And refilled the dregs
And gave him moss, and bugs, and some grass.

The moss roots grew long in the dish
But the tadpole continued a fish
We fed him twice weekly
And prodded him (meekly)
And dreamed of a hop, not a swish.

It took me too long to ask why
But once done, found he wasn't leg-shy:
Tadpoles in fall
Overwinter, that's all,
As babies, til the warm spring draws nigh.

(Perhaps he could see on the wall
The calendar that indicates fall?
For the warm classroom air
Feels like spring, always fair,
And would have fooled me as a baby and all.)

I think he'd been spawned in September
And I learned by the end of November
Then the pond turned to ice
The future didn't look nice
Was he meeting his end come December?

I brought him home with a heart feeling low
Into the porcelain tunnel he'd go
But Patrick said stop
(Patrick? the shock!)
Why not keep him til the melting of snow?

And so our strange tadpole lives on
A little fish in a very small pond
He swims and he poops
And eats homemade green soup
And knows more than he ever lets on.