The Snail Who Sang was a pretty much instant response to Crispina’s challenge this week.
CCC is Crimson’s Creative Challenge. Each Wednesday Crispina posts four pictures as prompts for us to do something creative — in 150 words or less. And to give folks like me a head start, she posts two of them in her Sunday post, and two more in her Tuesday post.
CCC033: The Snail Who Sang
The snail crawled along, enjoying the sunshine, searching for suitable food. Anything small enough and slow enough for its radula to gnaw and ingest.
Such a nice day inspired a song as it wandered along.
- “I’m a snail fail-de-rail, I’m a snail fail-de-rail,I’m a snail fail-de-rail,
- and I’ll have you for supper.”
This was such a beautiful song, and repeated three times, that a passing song thrush noticed. He landed above the wooden bridge the snail was currently engrossed with and sang its own song.
- “I’m a thrush ful-de-rush, I’m a thrush ful-de-rush, I’m a thrush ful-de-rush,
- and I’ll have you for supper.”
It flew down, grabbed the snail by its shell, and started bashing it on the wood till the shell smashed. Then he flew off and fed the broken snail to his nestlings.
© J M Pett 2025
I have of course stolen the song from the troll. I think this was the troll who lived under the bridge which the three Billy Goats Gruff crossed, but I may be mistaken. Someone will probably tell me who the fairy tale is attributed to, which is very kind.
How sad! But such is the cycle of life. And I like how you’ve used the troll’s song 🙂
The poor snail! But it serves as food in the ecosystem!
You’re correct about the troll song..
Sad story but he gave himself away 💜🌻
As soon as he started to sing I was thinking that wasn’t such a good idea! Great little story.