Asked for in my children’s yoga classes, by all ages, again and again:
I was drawn to the wacky, remarkable illustration on the cover of this children’s book when I was in a bookstore in Arizona, and pictured my students creating a “coyote” pose with grins of joy on their faces, chanting “Yippee-O-Ki-Yee”.
This colorful, outrageous book is a southwestern take of a familiar children’s rhyme.
A skinny coyote swallows a flea, “plucked from his knee, that tickly flea. Yippee-O-Ki-Yee!” The coyote goes on to swallow a lizard that ” slipped and slithered right down to his gizzard.” As the coyote gets bigger, the story gets crazier, as he swallows a bird, a chile, a cactus, a hat and even a bull, “Yippee-O-Ki-Yee!
Steve Gray’s cartoon character illustrations are remarkably detailed and as zany as the story. The colors of the characters and southwestern background are extremely vivid, drawing both adult and child into the book.
Imagine chair pose, a boot, or happy baby pose, a flea.
As I read There Was A Coyote Who Swallowed a Flea to my yoga class, we animatedly discuss the coyote, the action, and each crazy animal the coyote meets and swallows. We create a yoga pose for each animal or object, then do a “flow” of the asanas (poses) that we have imagined as we remember the book, and chant the refrain “Yippee-O-Ki-Ree”.
Jennifer Ward is the author of numerous children’s books, including I Love Dirt, and The Seed and The the Giant Saguaro.
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