“Absence of Malice” Judy’s Poem and Reissue of the Challenge!!!
Okay—the first person to answer my challenge was Marilyn Armstrong. She commented on her own Scottie named Bonnie, which made it a bit hard to construct a poem using as my first words the first words of her eight sentence essay. I actually used each of her first words twice, to enable me to construct a 16 line poem. Here it is:
I’m the owner of a Scottie.
I watch him tear around––
bonnie little terrorizer.
Terriers get around!
Which apparel did he chew up
that I wear every day?
It probably was not his fault,
most Scottie folks would say.
I’m guilty of the dumbest act.
I should have known the pup.
Bonnie little masticators,
terriers like to sup.
Which are the things they like to chew?
That is hardly recent news.
It seems that what their jaws like best
most certainly are shoes!
I’m still waiting for more entries for the challenge. Check out the quote and explanation of the prompt posted on my earlier posting HERE and post a link to your entry in my comments! If I find a juicy one on a topic other than dogs, I’ll write another poem as well, using the first word of each of your sentences as the first word in one of my lines., in order. Your entry can be a story, poem or essay.
Here is Marilyn’s comment I used to spark my poem:
“I’m glad sweet, retiring, shy little Morrie seems to be growing out of his “my jaws, the world” phase. I had one hound who never grew out of it and we lived in a state of siege for 12 years. Bonnie settled down around 2 years old, which is when most dogs seem\ to release those final gas bubbles from their funny little brains. Terriers mature slowly and stay puppy-like longer than most breeds. Which makes them terrorists — but lovable; you may WANT to strangle them, but usually wind up laughing.
That quote has worked for me in so many ways. It reminds me (often) that acts of true malice are relatively rare. Most stuff is done by accident or ignorance or just a flash of “duh” … to which, sadly, we all are prone.”
(Sorry, Marilyn. I missed this last line because it was on a separate page of my document. Since I’d already written the poem and since it would have added an extra line to the second and fourth stanzas, I didn’t go back and add it. Here is Marilyn’s last overlooked line: “But not Morrie! He’s always smart!”
√
