DOGGEREL, MAN'S BEST FRIEND
THE CORNERED POET
To your poet's corner go and sit,
Give me no puns crap,
You with your hapless rhyme,
You, Wesley S. Kime,
Sit there until you get over it,
You in your dunce cap.
ODE TO OGDEN
Shakespeare of olden
Days would be OK,
But I’d rather be an Ogden
Nash any old day.
SURE I DO
Sometimes I chuck the meter;
Sometimes I stow the rhyme;
Sometimes I don't remember either --
But I always think sublime!
On those not so brainy days
When my head's ensconced in haze,
I’m good for
Doodling dotty ditty doggerels,
Not much more.
FUMAROLE
This poet’s mind is a fumarole,
A sphinceterless open os,
Ejaculating meter rhythm rhyme.
I could sooner rein in my libido
Than all this dithyrambic floss.
That's easy to say in Octogenariancy,
In youth it was a toss.
NEVER GOING VIRAL
My lines may reek of hyperbola
But are sterile, no enterococci or ebola.
Of leaden style
They’ll never go viral.
PRETTY BUT DUMB
Senseless syntax maketh poetry poetic.
Double meanings or none whatsoever.
But simple sense it maketh hardly ever.
Me it maketh apoplectic and apologetic.
GROANING O's
O The way you know it's posy and isn’t prose,
O my groaning soul, is by all those groaning “Os.”
KNOW YOUR O’S, OH’S, & OATS
Now then, O ye students,
A balloon is mainly air, that’s all that’s in it,
A poem is composed of mostly O’s and Oh’s,
A poem’s breath, those cheery circular mutants,
Oh, but what rules rule for O or Oh?
O Who knows! Oh, Just wing it.
O FOR THE OS AND OHS
O and Oh, O forsooth and Oh, alas,
Neither O nor Oh today get ohs and ahs,
With luck a yawn, not even laughs,
Nor groans, no snorts, just token guffaws.
RHYME TIME
Breathes there a poet
Who doesn’t blow it
By always rhyming “fungus”
With, here it comes, “Among us”?
MAUDLIN MADELYN
O Maudlin Madelyn, O how long,
Must you drone, groan, bemoan,
Coming on O so strong
About your Chronic Fatigue Syndro-o-o-ome?
TIT AND NO TAT
Oh, you can have your pastry,
You can have your pesta pasta,
And keep your Pudding Hasty.
Just give me tit without the pasty.
THE SUNNY SONOGRAM
Oh let us compose a sunny sonnet
To the mammary sonogram,
Exonerating of malignancy the protuberance
Otherwise viewed with horny exuberance.
SPEAK STREAK
The devil made one serpent speak.
The Lord made Balaam’s ass sass.
But Disney makes all fur squeak.
Peace and quiet, it couldn’t last.
WORD NOT OF THE DAY
Even if ye knew the word from it ye’d shy away,
That’s OK for so did Hemingway.
Eons ago it had its day, and so has Hemingway.
But stick it in I would if I could -- Welladay!
SAME OLD MOLD
From the same old same old mold
Is cast every last channel of TV news
And all the gestures, voices, hair-dos
Of every last channel’s newshens,
Endless round of round table nuisance.
IN THE PRUNE OF LIFE
The vegan assumes
All health accrues from prunes.
when reality resumes,
It's runs to bathrooms.
IT’S A LAGUME
It’s easy to assume
The peanut’s a nut; it’s naught
But an indurated legume.
I'll bet you assume
The peanut is a nut,
But it’s not, you clot.
It’s legume, you Loony Tune.
WHAT'S THE USE OF COUSCOUS?
Cauliflower and elderflower
Are beaten and eaten,
Fettuccini plaited and plated,
Potatoes abraded and flayed,
A radish relished,
A turnip urped.
A beet you eat with meat.
Mushrooms may be
Exhumed and consumed.
But what is the use
Of couscous?
A Google OF POODLES
Of all doggies Sonja knows a caboodle,
Especially poodles,
But nothing of a noble foreign dog,
By pedigree King Charles Cavalier,
This she learned from Google:
He's just a commoner spaniel over here.
AS PAINS GO
Sticks and stones may break my bones
And jibes and diatribes abrade my hide.
Painful to my body parts, all such trauma.
But worse, the agony of CareObama.
THERE'S MORE TO AL GORE
Al Gore, he is an algorism
Al Gore’s an allegory
Of demagorguery.
Al Gore the Matador.
Al Gore I’m not especially for.
ACTIVIST PRAGMATIST
Wisdom for the pragmatist,
“Leave well enough alone,”
Is to the activist
Wisdom quite unknown.
A VIRTUAL POEM
Virtual bells!
Virtual bells!
Virtual all the way.
Oh what fun it is to ride
In a one-horse virtual sleigh!
ANCHORS AWEIGH!
Postmodernism is that slaphappy continent
Built on tectonic plates of colliding rubber.
All is relative, fifty iffy shades of gray.
Nothing is here to stay, feet of clay.
And nothing is true, fact is butter,
As leaky as a bladder gone incontinent.
Historic is gone, new is Queen for a Day.
POEMS • Pomes • Poy-YUMS
Hallmark rejects...
![UNTITLED, TITLED QUICKIES A certain lib named Daschel T. Is easily deeply troubled. Just the thought of taxes undoubled Dashes Daschel's equanimity. \ For a terrifying lollapalooza, Nothing matches a mullah with moola. \ The media fudges, The Clintons spin. The //www. Drudges, Where’s the aspirin? \ Pick a little here, a little there; A little fear, a little snare. A little of this, a little of that. Pick of nit a little, a lot of gnat. \ When Hollywood mutilates his fiction No mere money subdues the author’s rages. When Hollywood mutilates all history The historian mere money easily assuages. \ There was an Indian chief named Kohchapoos Who to the Pilgrim’s first feast invited was, Forsoose. To him to sip the chardonnay they offered It never dawned. Instead he chugged his ethnic Kohchapoos Joy Juice. [I'm so old I remember L'il Abner and Kickapoo Joy Juice -wk] \ This month’s officialese is "paradigm." Frankly, my dear, I do not give a dime. \ Today my secretary wasn’t showing up. She was home pregnant throwing up \ In adverse events religionists old-time Always perceive retribution divine. \ Homosexuality has exited the closet To become, of media and pulpit, the sacred cosset. \ Once “one nation, indivisible.” Now, alas, immiscible. \ How highly rated is Amtrak? Slightly higher than anthrax. \ Silly putty, Silly puppy. No nice posy, Very silly poesy. \ Pith and plinth, Cheddar cheese blintz. \ In days of yore a cold was caught. In days of now, a cold is fought. \ ADVICE Best not schmooze A sleaze. You’ll sink into his ooze And catch his fleas. \ Never schmooze A sleaze. You’ll lose your shoes, Soul, and sleeves. \ MATH NEVER AND FOREVER I never ever could. And forever never can. \ DEMOGRAPHICS OF WIT He was nothing if not unremittingly witty, If not at home, in every subcommittee, Witty witty, overbearingly, unbearably. Please adjourn the wit and spare me. \ Over there at Religion Today [sic] Postmodern maturity is spread thick For relevance but hardly reverence, For harangued meringue, For whimsy, it’s the designated milieu Of the piously agnostic pulpit and pew. \ THE MENU There’s been no change of menu, Only what they bring you. Even the sprouts and tofu Don’t taste like they used to. \ Sir Lancelot Said “alas” a lot. \ In days of yore, Knights, kings, and nature Shared the milieu, With nary a “pueh!” Nits and gnats, This and thats, Things with stings, stinks, and wings In and out of noble armor crawled at will, And beds as well. Less of harmony with nature a manifestation, Than parasitic infestation. \ In days of yore a king with serf Would never mingle, But with bugs and worse, He was a Marxist liberal. \ A POET HE ISN'T AND DOESN'T KNOW IT My song none hum — O woe, I a poet unsung, He doth sob. An unstrung youth, A callow slob Is closer to the truth, Truth on a cob. \ My heir’s hair’s No longer there. Genes Are mean. BURMA SHAVE \ An honest man Takes his stand. A politician A position. BURMA SHAVE \ A pair of aphorisms I can't equate: "All things come to him who waits"; "He is lost who hesitates." \ BORN AGAIN Once that odd idea I would deride. Now with vengance it I ride. \ What if dogwood bark barked Like a dog would? But should dogwood bark bark Or should it bite? \ It's bad when dogs are rabid. Lovely when dogwoods are rampant. \ Give not one rip For what is widely said. Listen up quick If it’s wisely said. \ At movies, buttered popcorn; At TV, pizza is the pop norm. \ Of TV ‘tis wisely said, It is, for squelching talk, a curse. But if it fills up silence dead, TV’s much the lesser worse. \ The mad cow jumped over the moon, And danced away with the rabid raccoon. \ Of an addiction he was a victim, Alas he forgot the “lick ‘em“ And went with the "join 'em" dictum. \ Anent Lent: Fish dish \ You are what you eat; To a Modernist artist, You are what you excrete. \ The media diversity may extol, But of conformity and uniformity it is the very heart and soul .](/images/u3629-424.png?crc=351768178)
SOROLLA
Now about this Spanish portrait painter,
Whose style is loose and not so daintier.
This old guy, his name's Sorolla,
Paints like a kid with a big Crayola.
MARY HAD A LITTLE
Mary had a little lamium,
Its leaf was varigated.
And everywhere that Mary went,
She was always tailgated.
[NOTE: Lamium is a kind of terrifyhingly fast-growing ground cover - wk]
OMEN
Behold, an Omen, that much is clear!
But what’s the message I am meant to hear?
Am I to make a detour, go around?
Or head straight at it by leap and bound?
GARY BLAZER
How now Gary Frazier
In you blue blazer,
Dost thou promote health
Or redistribute wealth?
[Note: GovCare started way back. a/o now,
I don't even remember
who Gary Frazier was. Google is no help. wk]
WHAT SAY MAGSAYSAY?
"Oley! a Spanish flea!"
What say, Hardy Magsaysay?
"Oh say," quoth he,
"Can't you see
Yon swarthy, sweating Andulesian flea
In flamenco shoes and puttee,
Rounding the Horn, squaring the
Malaysian Penninsulee,
Milieu of malaise, mayonnaise, and ennui
And muck?
Aboard the Atcheson, Topeka, and Sante Fe,
Aweigh, awash, awry, astray,
Amok?
Three fine galleons and buckets of Brie,
Are we in luck or whut!"
A HERMENEUTIC VALENTINE
Will you my valentine be,
My pretty little snuggle pea?
Does your tender little ear
Sweet nothings want to hear?
Then sweetly do I sigh
Of planet legislated green,
Of heaven's grace sans guilt,
Of evolution theistic.
And if all that you buy, all that gruel,
Kiss me quick, you fool.
FAUNA and SPRIGS OF FLORA
HOMAGE TO OGDEN NASH
DO NOT MOLEST THE MOLLUSK
Do not molest the mollusk's husk,
Else the scallop get up and gallop
Fast away on slug's legs, to fuss.
PSYCHOTHERPAY
Now that we have it peeled,
That avocado has been healed
Of a serious tendency to withdraw into itself.
We may yet preserve that fruit's mental health,
If someone doesn't squash it first.
So much for social plans however well rehearsed.
TERRITORIAL CLAIMS
Oh say can you see
How Nature’s critters stake a territorial claim.
One kind raises its hind leg to pee,
Another its beak to sing.
THE EEL
The eel was built to feel
A lot because he's got
A long electric keel!
The eel is a metaphor.
You know what it stands for.
COCCIDIOIDIES IMMITIS
You should be aware of this
Of the Coccidioides immitis:
His arthrospores, by a quirk of fate,
Are quite quick to disarticulate.
Thus weak in structural integrity,
It's strong in pathogenicity.
SLUG
Do not confuse the slug
With a beetle or a bug.
A beetle's armored with a chitinous kettle
and a bug is similarly equipped,
but the slug's a blob of mostly spittle,
Like what's hawked up in postnasal drip.
BRIGADE OF BAGETELLES
Trained brigade of tanned ants in khaki pants
Marching column right and column left,
Eyes eyes eyes-right, eyes-left
Eyes dull dots black dots like comedos
Microscopic mandibles clank to close,
Thighs the size of hairs,
Everywhere the thighs, the feet, they tramp,
Chants from little brittle throats:
O we are a brigade of bagetelles
Dispatched to disproportionate hells.
PUN WITH THE OTTER
I'm glad the playful otter has such fun
Cavorting, slipping, sliding all over the place.
My delight amends for being
Otterly prone to otter puns,
Like, you otter know the otter's daughter
From otter space.
Was there ever a poem about the otter
That didn’t rhyme him “oughter”?
If of the otter you must compose a pome,
Please leave the oughter alone.
SNORT AND CAVORT
The porpoise and the pig
Are both pretty big.
One likes to wallow and snort,
The other cavort.
WHAT'S THE PORPOISE OF IT ALL?
The tortoise and porpoise may sound alike
But they aren’t, not quite.
BUT NOT THE POSSUM
To Victorians, oh so poetically overwrought,
The very rose and every furry beastie
With beauty and sublimity were fraught,
But not the possum.
Even when feeling especially yeasty
Victorians saw the possum as naught
But a plodding parsnip, hardly awesome.
SENSIBLE CAT
Sensible cat, full of frisk and fizz,
He’s as physical as a cat can get.
But his sensible slogan is,
Never stand when you can sit.
WHALE WHALE HUMPBACK WHALE
Humpback whale, humpback whale
Some want laws to save it.
I just like to say it.
Humpback humpback humpback
Whale whale humpback whale.
KRILL THRILL
The humpback whale
Is hardly your food-frenzied male.
His jaws propped open agape,
He simply plows on through the seascape
Engulfing tons of plankton and krill at will,
That we’d dismiss as swill.
Shouldn’t the humpback whale’s sheer bulk,
Make him Captain Scary Hulk?
But to our disbelief, relief, surprise
He doesn’t pick on anybody his own size,
There aren’t any anyhows.
Furthermore his style is ballet blasé.
On his lazy side he glides, sashays, and plows
On through the seascape
With mouth propped agape,
Internalizing plankton and oil spill swill
And, going for the kill,
Yawns in krill at will.
An earthworm can engulf a cow
Somehow,
And doesn’t choke.
But the hugest beast that floats
Gulps sea gnats and motes.
Makes no sense nohow.
DEMOGRAPHICS
Now then, what do you call a koala
Prowling South Bend, Centralia, or Walla Walla,
Not Australia, its evolutionary habitat?
I’d call him homeless and a viable Democrat
