This collection is full of short but sweet poems. The author I’ve met earlier with her “Goblin Market” story that was an interesting and fun read in itself. Rosetti has a fine ear and the short poems have a lovely flow to me. The themes of motherhood and infant mortality mentioned in the introduction do ring true and do give pause, but I feel that for children’s poetry, they don’t always notice or take things as jarringly as we as adults might.

“Our little baby fell asleep,
And may not wake again,
For days and days, and weeks and weeks;
But then he’ll wake again,
And come with his own pretty look,
And kiss Mamma again.”

Here a child sleeps, but does not wake for weeks and weeks. Perhaps this child actually has died and the child that comes “weeks and weeks” later in his place is actually a second child “with his own pretty look”, but then maybe the child is actually terribly ill and returns to health again, which I can’t imagine was terribly common in the Victorian era, or in the least the awakened child would be greatly weaken and not live longer beyond this.
To actually use with children, I’d rather use something like “1 and I are 2-“ because as it also shows language skills, it can help with early math skills too. I recall using poems and rhymes to help with my math skills growing up, and I know those things are often hard for children to pick up. My mother and I were always on the search for pneumatic devices for remembering. Admittedly, some of the terms aren’t exactly commonly used these days, but they’re not entirely obscure. Also numbers are something children learn alongside their letters, so those are words they are already very familiar with. To make it more interactive, you can also insert other phrases. Instead of “3 and 3 are 6-//Barley sugar sticks.” Maybe try something like “3 and 3 and 6-//Sugar coated Kix.” Like the cereal!

Might the reawakening be in heaven? Rossetti WAS a devout Catholic.