Sycamore Seed (Poem and The Sycamore Game)

Sycamore Seed 

Sycamore seed;

whirling around;

wound up by the wind;

oh where are you bound?

Where the wind leads.

That’s where I’m bound.

Where will I wind up?

Who knows till it’s found.

Sycamore seed.

If you do not know,

why follow the wind

wherever it blows?

I follow the wind

wherever it blows

for wherever I land

a new sycamore grows.

The Sycamore game –

1.            PIECES: Each of the players have six game pieces that are the Sycamore seeds.

2.            AIM OF THE GAME: The object of the game is for players to get as many of their seeds to land upon fertile and not barren ground as possible.

3.            BOARD: The board is a map of fertile and barren or hostile regions divided into squares.

4.            DICE: Each turn a player first rolls a dice to decide how many squares a piece may move.

5.            SPINNING TOP: Then they spin a top to decide in which direction the wind is blowing. Whatever direction the spinning top shows (North, South, East or West), that is the direction in which they must move their piece.

6.            If a piece goes off of the edge of the board that is counted as barren ground.

7.            STARTING THE GAME: To begin with, players roll to put pieces on the board. For example, if a player rolls a six then they can put all of their pieces on the board at once.

8.            Players start at opposite ends of the board. One player begins on those squares in the top right hand corner and the other begins on the squares in the bottom left hand corner.

9.            EVENT CARDS – Apart from the wind, there are other things which might help your seed on its way and, during the course of the game, a player is entitled to draw a maximum of six event cards from a box.

10.          On each event card is written an incident which effects the movement of your seed; for example – “A passing bird, flying north carries your seed to its nest but drops it before it reaches its nest, six squares north”.

11.          However, though event cards may be helpful, they may also take your seeds a direction or distance that you don’t want to go.

12.          The first player to get all of their seeds onto one of the green fertile regions of the board wins the game.