Smart by Shell Silverstein

My dad gave me one dollar bill

Cause I'm his smartest son,

And I swapped it for two shiny quarters

Cause two is more than one!


And then I took the quarters

And traded them to Lou

For three dimes -- I guess he don't know

That three is more than two!


Just then, along came old blind Bates

And just 'cause he can't see

He gave me four nickles for my three dimes,

And four is more than three!


And I took the nickels to Hiram Coombs

Down at the seed-feed store,

And the fool gave me five pennies for them,

And five is more than four!


And then I went and showed my dad,

And he got red in the cheeks

And closed his eyes and shook his head--

Too proud of me to speak!


This poem is about a naieve boy who thinks he is so much smarter than everyone else. He thinks this because he keeps trading his coins with people and he thinks he is tricking everyone and getting more money but really he is getting less money. It was sarcastic of Shell Silverstein to name this poem "Smart" because it is the opposite of smart. In this poem, Shell uses repeatition of words at the end of every stanza. At the end of every stanza he says "and ____ is more than ____."