fables folktales · Ages 9-12

The Frog Who Wanted to Swell Bigger Than Fear

A frog tries to match the size of an ox and learns that envy can make a creature ignore the shape that keeps it alive.

The whole story

1. At first light, Pippin balanced on a lily pad and practiced landing on the same silver stone. Across the meadow, an ox stepped through the mist, and Pippin stopped counting his leaps.

2. By breakfast, Pippin watched Bruno, the ox, fill the morning with his broad shoulders. Pippin pressed his toes into the mud and wondered whether a creature that large could ever be overlooked.

3. Pippin drew in a breath until his sides rounded. He held it, waiting for the meadow to notice, while Bruno calmly tore a mouthful of grass.

4. His first breath escaped with a squeak. Pippin tried again, then again, puffing his cheeks until his shadow looked almost important, but Bruno's shadow still covered half the pond.

5. At noon, Pippin followed Bruno to the reed bed and filled himself until his belly brushed the stalks. The reeds bent around him, yet his lungs begged for room, and he refused to listen.

6. Then a warm rain drummed across the pond. Pippin's swollen sides would not fit beneath the broad lily leaf, so he released the breath he had been hoarding and settled into the shelter's cool, familiar curve.

7. From there, Pippin watched water slide over the leaf and settle into the roots. His small body could slip beneath leaves, between roots, and into quiet places where breath returned. He touched his satchel, where the acorn rested, and stayed still until the rain softened.

8. When the clouds opened, Bruno stood in the shining meadow, broad enough to reach the high willow leaves no frog could touch. Pippin stood at the edge of the reeds, no longer trying to borrow Bruno's shape.

9. Bruno's great body belonged to the open meadow, and Pippin's small body belonged to the reeds, roots, and leaf-shadowed water. Pippin breathed easily, let his own shadow lie where it fell, and finally understood: envy can make a creature ignore the shape that keeps it alive.

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