Licking Toads

I was reading the blog of a lady who lives in Hawaii.  She and her husband had been trying to figure out if they were looking at a toad or a frog.  Someone mentioned that if you lick it, you'll know if it's a toad or a frog because toads are poisonous. 

Years ago I read an article in the Kansas City Star, and it inspired me to write a poem about licking toads.  Lacking anything better to write about, I'll share my poem.

 LICKIN' TOADS

August, 1991 

(c) Donna Wood    

 
I've always read the papers, and I've read some funny stuff,
But I read something recently that struck me pretty rough:
It seems somebody figured out that toads will make you high.
You can lick 'em, or chop up their skin and smoke it, when it's dry.
The side effects are dangerous, but if you come through alive,
You can tell your friends you smoked a toad and, somehow, still       survived.
The ordinary garden toad, they say, will get you by;
But that Colorado River Toad will really make you fly!

I know it may sound funny, but I'd like to meet the guy
Who figured out that licking toads is going to make you high!
The first time he tried licking toads, had he had a couple drinks?
I wonder what he looks like, and I wonder how he thinks.    
He probably introduced his friends to the joys of licking toads;
Did they smear them with some jelly?  Did they try them alamode?
I s'pose one day somebody said, "This lickin' toads is grim; 
Let's kill the little fellas, and then we can smoke the skin! 

I'll bet they traveled near and far and searched the country through
Before they figured out that not just any toad would do.
One day, out in the Rockies, lickin' every toad he met,
Some weirdo hollered, "Over here's the best toad I've licked yet!"   
That poor old toad was popular:  they passed him all around.
The Colorado Spotted Toad was the best they'd ever found!
It's a psychedelic pleasure --- even better than LSD,
And with hop-toads running everywhere, you can have this thrill for free. 

Well, now it's made the papers, so the whole wide world will know,
And folks'll be lickin' and smokin' toad, anywhere you go.
You'll see them in the gardens, and in the middle of the roads
Pursuing that elusive high you can get from smokin' toad!   
Forget the crack and cocaine, and the marijuana, too.
That stuff is so expensive, when just any old toad will do.
It's a wonderful experience, a psychedelic thrill,
And the only little problem is, it could just get you killed!