I know I’m not supposed to be posting anything, but my friend Leslie sent me this email and of course it inspired a poem. Here is the list of collective nouns for ocean animals that she sent me.

Did you know….

It’s a smack of jellyfish
A shiver of sharks
A battery of barracudas
A romp of otters
A consortium of crabs
An audience of squid and
A fever of stingrays

 (Thanks @oceana for the valuable ocean info.)

This is what resulted!

When Seafolk Get Together

I’d like to smack that jellyfish for oozing here and there,
sticking to my elbows and globbing up my hair.
If I had known its tendency to stick right to my belly,
I would have brought some peanut butter to go with my jelly.

Sharks always make me shiver. You can’t tell where they are.
They might be nearly anywhere—swimming near or far.
The Chinese love their shark fin soup. They love its taste and crunch,
and sharks return the favor by having us for lunch.

Who knew a barracuda could navigate on land
and survive on highways as well as sea and sand?
All they need is batteries (the Plymouth folks discovered)
to become amphibious—both land and water covered.

If we made boots in their sizes, I know otters would stomp,
but since they must go barefoot, instead they dive and romp.
They open up their oysters by lying on their backs,
putting rocks on tummies and giving them great smacks.

A consortium of crabs can be an itchy deal.
Not the sort of gathering that one wants to feel.
Perhaps out on the beach it’s easier to bear,
but crabs should never gather in anybody’s hair!

Squid make a perfect audience. They do not mock or sneer.
They have eight hands to clap with, although they cannot cheer.
If you sit behind them, how fortunate for you,
for they wear no hats or hairdos to obstruct your view.

That guy there in that Stingray is a speeder and a weaver.
I think that you could say that he must have racing fever.
If he were a fish, it would be fine to go ballistic.
On land, alas, he’s just a fatality statistic.