Tag Archives: Silly Poems

Questions of Diminution

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Questions of Diminution

Are lady goblins goblets
or tiny fobs called fobblets?
A little blob a bloblet?
An hors d’ oeuvre corn a coblet?
A little daub a daublet?
A short-lived job a joblet?
A mob of tots a moblet?
A jewel box knob a knoblet?
A minor theft a robblet?
A single tear a sobblet?

(Very sorry for this one. Blame it on the goblin prompt given by Forgottenman and the resultant mental processes that led to my having to research whether there were in fact also female goblins. The answer is still somewhat unresolved.)

July 3, 1947

 

July 3, 1947

The date above is notable
for reasons that are quotable.
It marks the birth of someone who
has  brought these few words into view
to put them in her blogging queue.
(True, that is what all bloggers do.)

But if there is a blogging heaven,
four thousand one hundred fifty-seven
might certainly be in the running
for snapshotting, rhyming and punning—
all those things we bloggers do
to try to get a rise from you.

In fact, in numbers I’ve been sparing
in how my blog count has been faring.
Blogs four thousand one-fifty-nine
are the numbers I claim as mine
for former blog posts that are done.
The next will end in sixty-one!

With sixty, alas, nothing rhymes
and so it is the least of crimes
that I don’t quote it as a score.
A small malfeasance, nothing more.
As poems go, this is not the best,
so please just rate me by the rest!

 

The prompt today is notable.

Uriah Heep Meets Rocky Balboa on Rodeo Drive

Uriah Heep–an unctuous, cringing, overly-humble character from Charles Dickens was chosen by the British Telegraph as one of their favorite Dickens characters. I chose him as well for a meeting with another rather hard-to-take notable fictional figure way back at the beginning of my blog. Few people read that silly poem that chronicled the meeting between Heep and Rocky Balboa. HERE is a link if you’d like to take a peek back at it.

A portrait of Uriah Heep by Frederick Barnard (1846-1896), which was used to illustrate David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.

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A portrait of Uriah Heep by Frederick Barnard (1846-1896), which was used to illustrate David Copperfield by Charles Dickens. Photo: Alamy

The WordPress prompt today is bestow.

Old Crank

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Old Crank

He’s sort of wonky, sort of cranky.
Spits his chew into his hanky.
Plays his guitar sharp or flat.
Rarely knows where he is at.
Makes off with neighbors’ garbage lids,
yells at all the little kids.
His vision’s getting sort of dim,
so when the kids throw rocks at him,
he thinks that it is just a gale
pelting him with balls of hail.
Once he was a little kid,
doing as his parents bid,
but now it seems to be his fate
to be his home town’s reprobate!

The prompt today was crank.

A Dreaming Vocabulary: NaPoWriMo, Apr 14, 2018

A Dreaming Vocabulary

When you’re sleeping soundly in your nightie or pajammers
and you happen to be dreaming of teacups, sharks and hammers,
if the hammer pounds the teacup, spilling tea and cream
to soak the wobbly table that is also in your dream,
you might think good fortune has cruelly run out,
but that still does not explain what the shark’s about.

A dentist in a rowboat comes rowing quickly by.
He fixes that circling shark securely with his eye,
grabs him in a deadlock and pulls him o’er the side,
doses him with novocaine, then just drifts with the tide
as he extracts the teeth that he might use to chew
on anything that he encounters: fish or squid or you!

And just as he is finishing this grisly operation,
the shark begins a session of intense regurgitation.
First a full-grown seagull, then a pink silk ballet slipper
with the ballet dancer still attached, alive but not too chipper.
The shark is still recovering so toothless and so numb it
knows not that if it wants a meal, hereafter, it must gum it.

The whole group now returns to shore. The dancer dances off.
The seagull sits in shock and the shark begins to cough.
A mariachi hits the sand, complete with his guitar.
All of them a bit in shock, wondering where they are.
And to you, caught there  in dreamland, what message does this send?
Perhaps, my dear,  that everything comes out right in the end!

 

The Day 14 prompt is: Pick one (or more) of the following words, and write about what it means to dream of these things: Teacup, Hammer, Seagull, Ballet slipper, Shark, Wobbly table, Dentist, Rowboat.

Incandescent Insect Insomnia

photo from the internet                          

Both the Mills Brothers and Dean Martin recorded the song “Glow Worm” whose lyrics and tune I loved as a little girl. WordPress wouldn’t let me download the song from Youtube, but  please find it yourself and listen. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaBDPNKgj9A. Then don’t forget to come back for my reply:

Incandescent Insect Insomnia

When nature made the  glow worm glimmer,
would that she’d installed a dimmer;
for when I put out the light,
what I expect is total night.

When it puts itself in action,
I fear it sets up a distraction.
Little glow worm on the shelf,
please keep your glowing to yourself.

The prompt today is glimmer.

“Ant”cestry.Com

“Ant”cestry.Com

“I think we may be family,” was whispered in his ear,
but he couldn’t see who said it, though he looked both far and near.
Again that small voice spoke to him. “We share a family name,
although as the biggest, you possess most of the fame.”

Thus did the massive elephant notice for the first time
the tiniest of animals who’d finished its long climb
from the dirt so far below up to his mighty ear.
From foot to knee to shoulder, it had climbed in spite of fear

that one great flinch might cast it from the air down to the ground.
Yet still it journeyed upwards, driven to expound
on how great an irony, surely it must be,
that this small “ant” and the eleph”ant” must be family!

NaPoWriMo 2018, Day 9: write a poem in which something big and something small come together.

“Set to Music” Naughty Little Pleasures

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My talented friend Christine Anfossie just surprised me with a musical rendition of my poem “Naughty Little Pleasures,” a poem I wrote for day 1 of NaPoWriMo 2018. If  you’d like to hear it, click on the arrow below:

https://judydykstrabrown.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/naughty-pleasures-new-2.wav

If you like to read along, here is the poem again:

Naughty LIttle Pleasures

Naughty little pleasures, secret little games—
they are our private treasures, these solitary shames.
We never can admit them to family or friends,
for fear that doing so would  bring about their ends.
Childhood is when our private pleasure starts—
not stifling our sneezes or holding back our farts.
Eating the last cupcake or hiding Grandpa’s teeth.
Watching skirts on windy days to see what’s underneath.
Torturing sister’s Barbie Dolls and kidnapping her bears.
Reading Daddy’s magazines underneath the stairs.
Guzzling ice cream from the carton and milk right from the spout.
Opening sister’s love letters to see what they’re about.
Telling mom you’ll help her because she’s running late,
then licking all the cookies you’re putting on the plate.
If being perfect were more fun, then probably we would,
but there’s little pleasure in always being good.

NaPoWriMo

dVerse Poets Pub: Silly Fashion


Silly Fashion

July to March, April to June,
stir your boredom with a spoon.
Use a pot to brew your passion.
Clothe yourself in timely fashion.
Wear a bagel as a hat.

Steam up the air, water the cat.
Do what you must to pass the day,
for all things pass too soon away.

 

For dVerse Poets Pub

The Forgottenman Challenge. Done!!

After seeing my mixed bouquet in Cee’s daily flower challenge, Forgottenman challenged me to write a poem making use of the name of every flower in the bouquet.  Okay F-man, here it is. I rise to every challenge!!! (The names of the flowers in the bouquet are in bold print.)

Zinnia was the fairest maid the town had ever grown.
She flirted with the mill boy and claimed him as her own.
She rose and fed their baby with a silver spoon
each morning as her husband lay abed ’til noon.
To wake him up, she lay their child well within his reaches.
He woke to that sweet baby’s breath-—just redolent of peaches.
Brushing off her flour-dusted lover, Zinnia sent him on his way
to grind more grain for townsfolk who had the means to pay,
for although her dusty miller was not the working kind,
true love will not buy Gerbers nor diaper a behind.

Here is the bouquet again:

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Bouquet of zinnias, roses, baby’s breath, dusty miller, Gerber daisies.  jdb photo

Another response to Cee’s daily flower prompt.