Poetic Diversity

By Ken Marks


Last Sunday night I wrote my first poem in years. Its inspiration was an email from an old friend who said he couldn’t recall a single limerick that wasn’t risqué and asked whether I could. I didn’t want to leave him hungering for a limerick that wasn’t sexually suggestive, so I wrote one:

Guest “Pome of the Season”

16 Years Ago:
The 2006
Christmas Pome

By Bill Keene

[This delightful light verse had not been re-run (until today) since its appearance here on December 24, 2006, at 6:47 a.m.]

A lot of folks don’t know that Santa only has one eye.

The other is a glass replacement through which he can spy

all the little boys and girls, moms and daddies, too.

At any time of year he could be looking right at you.

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#7)

By Geoffrey Dean


Threesomes

got rear-ended
honor defended
license suspended

ladies befriended
here’s how it ended
life upended

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#6)

By Geoffrey Dean







Flood Warning

Near the banks of the northernmost reaches of the Mississippi

Birds time their song to the drum of incessant rain.

The thrill of settling near this storied waterway is

Drowned out by current concern: how well do rivers drain?

_______________
(5/18/2019)

Copyright © 2022 by Geoffrey Dean

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#5)

By Geoffrey Dean


Symphonic Gr8ness

Mahler 8 is simply great –
What a way to celebrate,

Even with trumpeters who feel the need

To blast your ears until they bleed.

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#4)

By Geoffrey Dean


Slipped Up

I slipped in the shower once upon a time

From a major buildup of bathtub slime.

Moral is, I could have written “grime”

And who’ve cared – it’s still a rhyme.

_______________
(5/16/2019)

Copyright © 2022 by Geoffrey Dean

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#3)

By Geoffrey Dean


Definitions

Gritted too fierce – tooth chipped.

Stretched too far – pants ripped.

Turned too much – screw stripped.

Bird on branch – talons gripped.

Wit too sharp – one-liners quipped.
Thirst too strong – slurped, not sipped.
Psychedelic – on acid tripped.
Kitchen puddle – faucet dripped.
Sudden wealth – generously tipped.
Expedited – already shipped.
Invisible – unnoticed, skipped.
Nails too long – get them clipped!
_______________
(5/16/2019)

Copyright © 2022 by Geoffrey Dean

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#2)

By Geoffrey Dean


Laying Low

Snuggled soundly in your grave,

No more need to wash and shave,

Chucking foods you know you crave.

Now you’re free to misbehave.

No more need to pay the rent,
Blast your quads or get a stent,
Regret the gaffes you couldn’t prevent,
Or mourn the money you made and spent.

You’ve begun a brand new phase,
Laying low in languorous laze,
Boxed up in formalde-haze,
Wiling away your deathful days.
_______________
(6/24/2019)

Copyright © 2022 by Geoffrey Dean

Museful Mornings: Pre-Pandemic Poetry (#1)

By Geoffrey Dean


Meaning-Less

Some poems are a crime
For the sake of a rhyme—
Total waste of time
And not worth a dime.

Words strung along
In vacuous song
For an imagined throng
To sing all wrong.

Rhyming come easy
Makes me queasy,
Sounds so cheesy—
Doesn’t even please me.

That rhyme didn’t work—
Now wipe off the smirk.
It’s time to shirk
This line of work.
_______________
(6/24/2019)

Copyright © 2022 by Geoffrey Dean

Woes of Biden Harris Plumbing

By Moristotle

There was a Trumper by name of Biden Harris;
Dad had named him Junior the more to widen parous.

Postscript to 99.915 (a viral poem)

Especially for those who read only email notifications of postings here (and don’t read the comments)

By Moristotle

The comments following the publication yesterday of motomynd Paul Clark’s “viral poem” were almost as interesting as the poem itself –maybe even more interesting, actually, however brilliant the poem was (to quote one commenter).  So...
    I’ve selected and assembled some of the comments here. Let this be a lesson to those of you who generally read only our email notifications of blog postings: maybe you should change your ways and start visiting the blog itself...and reading comments....

Creation or Evolution?

Compromise (a poem)

By Michael Vázquez, when he was 11

[Contributed by his mother, Sharon Stoner, who reports that at age 11 Michael “wrote and illustrated a book of his poems, including some limericks. Using cardboard and stick-and-peel vinyl, he made a book to put them in. I still think he missed his calling to be a writer.”]

There’s an argument in the nation,
about evolution and creation.
    Tho I don’t know what it is,
   I hope they settle the whole biz.
Maybe compromise, and call it Evolation!

Copyright © 2019 by Sharon Stoner

America’s Froth of July

By Moristotle









Worshippers pump up his act of demigod,
rallying to bump him to an epilogue,
    playing their role assigned, his chumps,
    repeating loud his smashing thumps,
humping to install him two-term demagogue.

Copyright © 2019 by Moristotle

Drive sober, or it’s all over

By Moristotle

Road signs in Maryland warn, “Drive sober” –
they say to do it “or get pulled over.”
    Drinkers who think it will not show,
    if they let up and drove real slow,
get told, when stopped, they were drifting all over.

Copyright © 2019 by Moristotle

A trip, limerick’d

Grand Marais with Grand Mo & Ma

By Geoffrey Dean

When Mo saw the light he declared
As he deeply pondered and stared,
    “Well, I’ll be,
    It’s made in Paris!”
But from brightness his sight was impaired.

Goines On: In the company of poets

By Moristotle

Goines observed that a lot of poetry was appearing on a certain weblog lately, and as he drove along the freeway he became aware that he was composing something himself. His fingers were even tapping out the words on the steering wheel.
    Turning his attention to the words coalescing under his fingers, his excitement mounted and the freeway receded in his awareness. “The weblog was having a run of good luck....”

Sandwitchery

Sarah Angst postcard art

An apocryphal history

By Geoffrey Dean










For those who are listening, a tale is in store,
A tale about sandwiches, witches, and more.
One Scholar inquired, when music was done,
How was, after all, the sandwich begun?
I told her sincerely what little I knew,
Of the Sandwich Earl’s haste as his appetite grew.
Her skeptical look and her lack of reply,
Showed me clearly I’d failed to reveal the full why.
If one is impatient, no relief will be found,
For this tale’s neither brief, nor by accur’cy bound:

One lone Chevy in the big back lot (a pink poem)

By Geoffrey Dean

One lone Chevy in the big back lot
Grabs my eye as I find my spot.
No big deal, or so you might think –
’Cept this Chevy is a sparkling pink.

Guest "Pome of the Season"

The 2006 Christmas Pome

By Bill Keene
©Copyright 2006

A lot of folks don't know that Santa only has one eye.
The other is a glass replacement through which he can spy
all the little boys and girls, moms and daddies, too.
At any time of year he could be looking right at you.

I only mention this because it changed ol' Santa's life,
by being instrumental in the meeting of his wife.
In early days, the eye was loose, it didn't really fit,
and now and then would just fall out, and roll around a bit.

It was a nuisance, that's for sure, and quite a bit of trouble.
More than one went missing, or smashed itself to rubble.
One day at a bus stop underneath the pouring rain
with no hint of a warning, the eye popped out again.

Before it hit the ground or even had a chance to fall,
a pretty girl reached out and snatched it like it was a ball.
A grateful Santa smiled at her, and soon they started dating.
'Til finally it led up to the royal North Pole mating.

And though it may seem foolish to the cynics who ask why,
Santa went and married the first girl to catch his eye.