Tag Archives: discarded words

Merry Merry Quite Contrary

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Merry Merry Quite Contrary

By January, “Merry” is an attitude we’re through with—
that once Christmas is over, we don’t know what to do with.
I’ve never heard one person say “Merry Fourth of July,”
as they send a rocket soaring into the sky.

As I review the situations for a celebration,
“Merry” is never used again to signal our elation.
“Have a merry birthday” is a phrase we don’t adore
as we celebrate the fact we’ve piled up one year more.

By the time Christmas is over, I think we’ve used up “merry.”
Are we tired of this adjective? My thought on this is “Very!”
“Happy” seems to be enough for all else that we do—
sufficient for occasions we celebrate anew.

Prompts today are adore, situation, anew, merry, bother and review.

Forgotten Words

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Forgotten Words

Sometimes a certain word just doesn’t clink.
It doesn’t fit in in the place where we think.
It’s not in our lexicon. We can’t remember.
Not only won’t spark. There’s not even an ember
of inspiration to trigger a thought.
We only remember what it is not.

What could be therapeutic at bringing it in
from where it’s been ostracized. What about gin?
A good stiff martini might loosen our brain
and help us remember what it means again.

It hangs somewhere in back like a not-much-worn pendant,
covered up by more popular, less independent
words more ubiquitous, used every day.
More popular, funny and modern and gay.

But somewhere in the shadows, in the back of our mind
are words we’ve forgotten of the long-ago kind,
ready to pop out in most unlikely times
when we’ll use them in novels and stories and rhymes.

Then they’ll shake out their wrinkles and rub off their rust
And rejoin the world, leaving footprints of dust
in the minds of all readers, who for sure when they read them
will use them again when they happen to need them.

Prompts today are clink, lexicon,  ostracize, independent and  therapeutic,

Leftovers

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Leftovers

I’m feeling bodacious and pregnant with thought.
I’m ready to share everything that I’ve got.
Words weighty, bodacious and perhaps erogenous—
all of the parts of me rare or homogenous—
furnish the page when I’m in writing mode
and equipped to dig into the old mother lode.
I’m fertile with words and with erudition,
all my great plots coming into fruition,
but give me some room at this time of the day
for discarded words to get out of the way.
Don’t read this blog lest it turn you morose,
for you’ll trip over words if you follow too close.

Words abandoned and spurned lie below, broken-hearted—
disjointed phrases that I merely started—
I know it seems silly. Totally absurd,
but please give a small glance at a phrase or a word
that’s left over below, for words have feelings, too.
Steal a few for yourself from this discarded queue
if you should find any appealing to you
and write your own poem when you feel in the zone.
It’s the least I can do to try to atone
for my failure to launch them in poems of my own.
Otherwise, they will lie here abandoned, alone,
with no flesh around them. Words stripped to the bone!

Prompt words today are erogenous, pregnant, furnish, bodacious and mode.

       audacious                       bought          bode

                        tuition           darted      started.     do   glue      imbue

few                   hue   queue. 

                    cue rue stew               sue                 two

come into view                 whew            you                    zoo

verbose
code         goad lode             node rode           toad 
        phone              hone                alone stone
               shone tone    bone