Tag Archives: humorous poetry

Unsolitary Confinement

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Unsolitary Confinement

When I’m walking down the street, my bracelets jingle jangle,
executing dialogues—bangle against bangle.
Calling up to earrings that answer as they dangle,
warning errant necklaces not to twist and strangle.
Every little moving piece—every single spangle
creates a  cacophony that’s more than I can wrangle.
Just a little peace and quiet’s all I hope to wangle
as, thrown into my jewelry box, they’re silenced by the tangle.
They’re driven by their fear that their proximity will mangle
if they even try to move to aim for a new angle.

 

 

The prompt today is jangle.

Cringeworthy

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Cringeworthy

A dripping tap, a creaking hinge,
the very sight of a syringe,
running short while on a binge,
well-meaning friends whose words infringe
upon my punch line, or just a tinge
of sarcasm in a response can make me cringe.
But none of these can quite unhinge
me half as much as when I singe
or cut too short my forehead fringe!

 

 If I ever ignite my hair on fire over a birthday cake or let them
cut my fringe this short again, just shoot me!

The prompt today was cringe.

Travel Illusions

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An Andalusian Businessman Visits Mexico

When business problems brought disillusion,
I hoped to prompt their fast diffusion,
jumping to the fast conclusion
that a coronary occlusion
could be allayed best by the fusion
of tequila and a lime
and so I thought that it was time
to move from Spain to Mexico
to see how well my life would go
in climes more southern, still, than mine.
I’d heard it said on the grape vine
my college sweetheart still lived there.
I thought I’d see how she might fare.
But when this friend sought dissolution
of her marriage, my inclusion
as a witness brought confusion.
It seems the judge had the delusion
that she and I were in collusion—
that it was I who broke their fusion.
He gave me three days of seclusion,
thinking that my simple exclusion
might furnish them a love transfusion.
The Spanish/Mexicano fusion
I now know is mere illusion.
That we’re joined by language is a delusion.
What exacerbated the confusion
was that I spoke in Andalusian!

 

The prompt today was illusion. (Image downloaded from the Internet.)

Loop de loop

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Thought I’d have to do this job myself, but Pasiano took over immediately and did a beautiful job.

Loop de Loop

Every little hole drilled, every little loop
helps attach the walls for—our new kitty coop.
They’re tired of the inside. They want to get out.
They’ve got cabin fever—I’ve not any doubt.

They’ve taken over all my house—bathroom, sala, kitchen.
So many handy spots to hide while they’re mama-ditchin’.
They pulled down all my CD’s and ate my bird’s nest too.
So many great high perches. Always something new.

But mama’s running out of time. She has too much to do
to spend all of her time running this temporary (?) zoo.
Some outside time is what we need—these 4 kittens and me—
a little outside running place will set all of us free.

So Pasiano’s attaching walls over the side gate bars
to protect the kitties from dogs and speeding cars.
Although escape to the big world I’m sure they’d find sublime,
we hope the napa palms are too slippery to climb.

The particle board is all installed.  The kittens in fresh air
leap and climb and hide and play. They find it lovely there.
They don’t answer to their names, their naming is so new;
They are Kukla, Fran and Ollie and the white girl we call Roo.

Will the big cat come to visit, or perhaps a frog or two?
That would give them other interesting things to do.
As for me, I finally have some time to do some writing
with nothing climbing up my leg—scratching, mewing, biting.

Kittens are so precious, a constant fun delight;
but I can’t be petting kittens every hour—day and night.
They had two inside places. Now they have an outside other.
No one can tell who likes it most—the kittens or their mother!

 

Olie and Roo have a wonderful time rolling in the dirt, playing with palm fronds and trying to climb the slippery trunks of the trees. So do Kukla and Fran for a half hour or so, but . . .

soon I could hear their piping little “mew mew mew”s.  They’d climbed between the bars and were begging for me to open the sliding screen to let them in.  Within minutes, they were curled up in separate drawers in the bathroom, as was Ollie. Soon, only Roo remained outside, asleep in the sun, where she still is two hours later!

I would have shown you many more photos, but alas, my computer drive is full again and I can’t download any.

 

The prompt today was loop.

Morrie at the Beach: Heaven Scent

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Morrie at the Beach

Everywhere he wanders,
everywhere he goes
is a place to stick his
curious little nose.

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Birds are drifting over,
hundreds at a time;
yet his nose is stuck in
something more sublime.

Aromas are his poetry, 
scents to him are words.
He has no time for looking
at these air-bound birds.


Even when they’re floating
nearby on the sea,
He only has time lately
for odors and for me!

What to many is simply a bad odor can be fascinating to others. I am so curious about what Morrie can detect as he sniffs everything on the beach!!

In the Pink: Mismatch

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Mismatch

When a certain fella has had a drink
or two or three, he’s bound to wink
at the little lady dressed in pink.
Her drink’s cubes give a subtle clink
as she decides what she might think.
Is he a stud or just a fink?
His clothes are sort of rinky-dink,
yet her long lashes, swathed in ink,
flutter in a come-on blink.
One fingernail is seen to sink
into her glass. He’s at the brink
of coming over to seal the link.
She checks her breath.  It doesn’t stink.
She reaches down and dons her mink.
But then he stops and seems to shrink.
In this sure deal there seems a chink.
It’s clear that when she deigned to flirt,
she missed the writing on his shirt.
“Be kind to animals,” it said,
“Who’d be caught wearing something dead?”

The prompt word today is “pink.”

Three Elevenies: NaPoWriMo 2017, Day 23

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 An elevenie is an eleven-word poem of five lines, with each line performing a specific task in the poem. The first line is one word, a noun. The second line is two words that explain what the noun in the first line does, the third line explains where the noun is in three words, the fourth line provides further explanation in four words, and the fifth line concludes with one word that sums up the feeling or result of the first line’s noun being what it is and where it is.

Here are mine:

Minds
collect facts
in your head
for remembering when needed,
perhaps.

Heads
collect hats
that they store
on racks, dreaming of
outings.

Clouds
hoard drops
meant for seedlings
but rain on parades
instead.

Small Fry

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Small Fry

We were small fry in a grown up world,
our dresses starched, our hair tight-curled
on a candlestick by mothers
who scrubbed the faces of small brothers
with fingers they had spit upon
to purge the dirt they’d lit upon.

We had no choice in any of this.
Nor in the neighbor lady’s kiss.
Sour and moldy though she might smell,
we pretended we loved it well.
So went the life in days gone by
so long as you were just small fry.

Now children pose for selfies and diss
the thought of an old lady’s kiss.
They refuse to  run through traces.
Don’t allow spit-scrubbed-at faces.
Skirts go unstarched, hair goes uncurled
now that children rule the world!

Fry is the WP prompt today.

Work Week

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IMG_3604Work Week

Monday

The day’s become unravelled. The night’s begun to fall,
yet I’ve not accomplished anything. I’ve done nothing at all
except cooking a curry and writing several drafts
of poems still uncompleted–they’re bobbing here like rafts
afloat upon my consciousness but have nowhere to go.
The words all came so quickly, but their gelling has come slow.
They want to group together in concrete communities,
but instead they’re fluttering like moths and landing where they please.

Tuesday

I’m a syllable collector, a hoarder of each word
without a purpose for them. It’s come to be absurd.
Verbs are piled up on shelves, adjectives under foot.
The gerunds hang like spiderwebs. I have no place to put
The adverbs and the articles. They leak out of my head.
When I nudge them into lumpy piles, they hide beneath the bed.
I’m going to have a housecleaning of consonants and vowels.
Collect them up in buckets and wipe them up with towels.

Wednesday

I’ll sort out all the lovely words. The ones I like, I’ll hoard,
then pile the others in tidy stacks and tie them up in cord.
I’ll keep the good ones by my desk to sort through when they’re needed.
Bad words go in the basement, unsorted and unheeded.
Then I’ll have a yard sale of unused words like “pickle”
and sell them in unsorted lots—a handful for a nickel.
Then perhaps I can make room for words more orderly
that come to me in sentences that make more sense to me.

Thursday

My muse is hyperactive, I need to tame her down.
Instead of resting close to me, she runs all over town
collecting words at random— funky words like “phat”—
so when I really need her, I don’t know where she’s at.
Then when I am sleeping, she unloads word after word
until there’s no room left for them. It has become absurd.
They’re piling up around me. They’ve reached my nose and ear.
I cannot swim my way through them. I’m smothering, I fear.

Friday

That’s why I’m calling poets, every novelist or bard
to have a drive-by of my house and stop here at my yard.
Bring a bucket and a rake. Take all the words you please,
for now they’re raining down like leaves falling from my trees.
Just gather them in armloads. I won’t find it queer. 
Better bring a wheelbarrow if you cannot park near.
You do not need to pay for them. Today they’re yours for free.
If you don’t help I fear that words will be the end of me!

Saturday

YARD SALE
Take what you wish. Please do not disturb occupant.

 

P.S. If you’d like to take any words or phrases or lines from this poem to prompt your own poem, please do.  But please, please send your poem as a comment here–or send a link.

The prompt today was unravel. The link to NaPoWriMo Day 11 is HERE.

Temporary Saints

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Temporary Saints

Sunday morning, dressed to the nines,
we joined our proper church school lines,
sat upon paint-peeling chairs
that barely fit our derrieres
and were shaken free of sins and taints.
Rows of little Sunday saints,
we learned our Bible verses well,
secure from thoughts that led to Hell—
at least until the closing bell.

 

You’ll find more about Sunday School and bleached-white souls here: https://judydykstrabrown.com/2015/12/30/i-used-to-eat-red/

The NaNoWrMo prompt for this ninth day was to write a nine-line poem.