Category Archives: humorous poem

An Apologia for Gasconade*

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An Apologia for Gasconade*

This poem, per se, is not profound, in fact it’s rather frowsy.
As poems go, I fear that it is going to be lousy.
Pretentiousness in meter, a travesty in rhyme,
I really fear that reading it will be a waste of time.
Its sheets will become linen, its walk a promenade.
The entire verse will turn, I fear, into a gasconade.*
If you see more than this in it, you’re seeing pareidolia.*
If you don’t know what this is, kindly refer to the scholia!.*

 

Prompts today are frowzy, per se, pareidolia, gasconade and linen.

*A gasconade is extravagant boasting or bragging. *A pareidolia is a psychological phenomenon in which the mind perceives a specific image or pattern where it does not actually exist, such as seeing a face in the clouds.

*Sesquipedalian  describes someone or something that overuses big words, as some of the prompt sites have lately.

*Scholia are grammatical, critical, or explanatory comments – original or copied from prior commentaries – which are inserted in the margin of the manuscript.

Blame the “Sesquipedalian” on me, as well as the  “scholia ,” which  was very handy as a rhyme for “pareidolia,” which I’m not responsible for.”

Nomenclatural Revenge

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Nomenclatural Revenge

My repulsive nickname is an affront to my pride.
Whoever might have coined it most assuredly has lied.
When I queried who the rascal was, the usual rumor was
that nasty girl Rebecca, and the reason was because

I was dating Walter, the one she lusted for,
but who, because he prefers me, continues to ignore
the bodacious Rebecca, remaining in my arms
just because he prefers my  considerable  charms.

In spite, that bitch Rebecca says the name “Clock Face” should fit
because my face has passing time written all over it!
So I have coined a name for her. I’m going to call her “Lips”
for all the food  passed through them that’s recorded on her hips!

Kiss-off, Rebecca!

 

Prompts today are clock face, bodacious, query, rumor.First image by Glen Hodson on Unsplash. Second photo by me.

The Behavioral Linguist in Love: May 17, 2022

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The Behavioral Linguist* in Love

A thoughtful, scientific man, he chose his words with care.
No ordinary words would do. Only ones most rare.
He first spied her in the springtime, finally met her in the fall—
a simply gorgeous maiden—comely, willowy and tall.
But months of choosing his first words seem to have done him in.
What should have been his saving grace turned out to be a sin.

Enthusiastic in his love, he just had to express
his much-gone-over feelings about her loveliness.
He’d formerly determined not to use just any word,
but his final declaration turned out to be absurd.
He should have called her beautiful and just left it at that,
for when he called her pulchritudinous, she thought that he meant fat!

 

*Note: New to the world of behavioral science, Behavioral Linguistics is the science-based use of language to persuade. It’s rooted in nudge theory combined with psychology, sociolinguistics, and principles of marketing. Language is a powerful way to change behavior.

Prompts today are behavioral, enthusiastic, pulchritude, fall.  Images by Fabio Lucas and   Mandy Zhang on Unsplash.

Impressionable Dozer

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Impressionable Dozer

The whole house is sleeping—the dogs and the cats
on the chair and the sofa and their cushy mats.
Even the air seems stilled in its rush.
I am calmed by its torpor and lulled by its hush.

Although there are labors I know I should do,
I survey my agenda and plan it anew.
It’s hot in my bedroom, but the sofa looks nice.
I go to the kitchen for water and ice.

Then I grab my computer and spread myself out.
With no one to disturb, as there’s no one about,
I may nod off myself before long, but I hope
that I’ll finish this first, but as you can see…..

Nope.

The dVerse Poets prompt today is to write a Quadrille on the topic of sleep. Ironically, just before looking up the prompt, I had just taken the above photos and was thinking of writing about exactly that topic. Thus, this poem that half-fills the bill. Not a quadrille, but I really did fall asleep before finishing it so I should get double points for succumbing that fully to the prompt..

Now, guess where I am headed?

 

Flower Power

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Flower Power

As it slipped off the shelf, the flower gave a growl.
It never intended to go on the prowl.

It’s against flower ethics to go off on one’s own,
unopened, unblossomed and not fully grown.

No flower’s a star. They’re all one of the bunch,
but given a shot at it, I have a hunch

that beneath every garden, the flowers below
are driven to rise up—to open and crow,

to greet the new morning and bask in its heat,
and that then they ‘d be off if they only had feet.

Their one chance at freedom is if they are clipped
and bunched into bunches, then bartered and shipped

to  exotic places where the minute they’re sold,
they’ll be off to adventures and their world will unfold.

Then if perchance they are placed up on shelves,
they may tumble to earth to be all by themselves.

Short-lived as they are, they might think as they fall
from their limited knowledge, that they’ve seen it all!!

 

For Sunday Swirl’s Wordle 553, the prompt words are: star shelf growl slip open flower crow against prowl beneath beat shot.

Revolt at Walmart

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Revolt at Walmart

Give us the proper rebate if you want us to behave.
We have our coupons in our hands and we’re not going to cave.
It is not iniquity to ask for what you’re due.
Accede to our demands or we’re going to mount a coup.

So what if it’s a misprint in the paper? Not our fault.
Produce what you offered, for we’re not going to halt.
Although you say to honor it would amount to a steal,
20 for 1 seems to us a reasonable deal!

Prompt words for the day are proper, beam, rebate, iniquity and behave.

Overeducated

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Overeducated

I rue the day I sent my oldest kid to college,
for ever since he’s been deluging us with knowledge.
From “dermatones” to other concepts we can’t grasp,
his pedestrian lectures make us want to gasp.
He uses words archaic since majoring in Chaucer,
ostentatiously positioning his “cuppe” in his saucer.
He bores us all to death when his golf club raises turf.
He doesn’t raise a divot. Instead he cuts a kerf!
Constantly, he leaves us in a state of consternation
simply by engulfing us in too much information.

 

 

Prompt words today are dermatone, tear, archaic, kerf and pedestrian. Illustration thanks to Muhammad Rizwan on Unsplash.

Words for a Formerly Rejected Would-be Lover

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Words for a Formerly Rejected Would-be Lover

The prospects are quite iffy that you’ll shift my view,
but come equipped with custard and I’ll take a spin with you.
We’ll see if we have anything in common other than
a taste for boiled custard and a mania for flan.

Prompt words today are shift, spin, custard, iffy and equipped. Image by Artem Beliaikin on Unsplash.

Face Off!

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Face Off!

It’s always there in front of me, greeting people first.
With having to live up to it, I always have been cursed.
When I want to look pious, it breaks out in a grin
revealing that within me there is a bit of sin.

It blushes when that boy walks in that I don’t want to know it.
I’m trying to be mysterious, and then I go and blow it!
It heats up and blushes when I’m trying to be cool.
How can something a part of me break every single rule?

When I doll up in my finest, then spend an hour on it,
adding shadow, blush and lashes, it decides to grow a zit!
I’m tired of facing up to its erratic bad behavior.
It seems to be my enemy when I most need a savior.

I’d like to go before it to decide what people see
before my face inserts itself, claiming to be me.
Then Covid comes along and gives me everything I ask.
Ironic that it takes a plague to furnish me a mask.

 

Prompt words today are faces, heat, pious, erratic, doll.

Big Mac (For The Sunday Whirl Wordle 552)

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Big Mac

That  alchemy turns lead to gold may be more than lore,
or so says Modern Physics*, but MacDonald’s does much more
by making gold and silver out of snack bar food,
feeding Big Macs, shakes and fries to a hungry brood.
Drunk fools go there for coffee, lonely hearts go to make friends.
Why we greet the golden arches more or less depends
on what we feel we’re lacking. Sometimes, company will do.
Or you may need a hamburger, in fact you may need two.
After you have plowed your furrows, changing clods to dirt,
wipe the soil from your hands and change your soiled shirt
and head out to McDonald’s. You’ll never rue the day
when you order Macs and fries and tuck them all away.
You may have flunked your physics test, my dear, but never mind.
The golden arches provides comfort of the tastebud kind.

*“What is Alchemy? – Live Science https://www.livescience.com › 39314-alchemy Mar 24, 2016 — Alchemy is the ancient practice of trying to turn lead into gold. Modern physics equipment may finally make that quest a reality.”

Wordle prompts for The Sunday Whirl: 552 : sometimes never snack bar drunk fools gold silver alchemy physics dirt clod.  Image by Amirali Mirhashemian on Unsplash.