This week's prompt at Poetry Thursday was "humour". It was suggested that we might, for instance, take a joke and turn it into a poem. While I don't think any of my poetry is laugh-out-loud funny, I do have a few poems that are in a lighter vein and might perhaps induce a small smile or at least a twitching of the corners of the lips. Here is one, that results from the insect problem we have in a home that is rather full of stored paper of various sorts:
Everyone’s a Critic These Days
Silverfish are eating my words
I look in drawers for notes I made
and find ragged paper.
Holes appear in the middle of my poems
ilver ish r ating m wor s
ragged pap
Silverfish hide in damp corners,
emerge up the plughole,
scurry behind the bookcase.
At night there is one crawling across the pillow.
silverfish hide scorn
night scrawl
Silverfish are eating my words
and shitting them out in small gritty piles
behind the furniture
and in corners of drawers
Words are turning themselves
into insects and crawling off the page
They mock me in slow anagrammatic dance
Silverfish are eating my words
liverish sword
vile feat
evil tears
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And as a bonus, here is a small poem that resulted from the random prompt generator at the Poetry Thursday site. The words it gave me were "flock", followed by "abacus". I'm not sure if this counts as a humorous poem, but it does depend on a pun:
You can count on
a flock of birds
perched on the telegraph wires
like beads on an abacus.
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For more humorous poetry, visit Poetry Thursday
Thursday, May 17, 2007
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21 comments:
Lovely Catherine - now I have an (I'm sure vastly undeserved) image of your house over-run with small, scurrying insects! In our house it's the occasional weta that makes its presence felt.
As an aside, Tawatawa Reserve is at the very Southern end of Kingston. The Southern Walkway passes by, and I followed the walkway all the way down the hill through regenerating bush to Island Bay. I can highly recommend the Southern Walkway, if you're down this way and feeling energetic.
At least those are better than cockroaches which seem to thrive in the hot humid climate here in Delhi. I liked the images here.
The second works very well too.
Thanks!
Both of these made me smile!
Hi Catherine -
The silverfish were fun little devils
"The silverfish are eating my words,
and shitting them out in small turds"
I liked the short "flock" piece -- very visual.
What part chance played in your random words. Brilliant little piece there. I also loved your first poem - I could actually see all the letters slowly disappearing...
:)
I was really tickled by the silverfish - so clever and light in its humour. And you managed to take your flock where mine wouldn't go. - That was my word on the random prompt generator too!
Elegantly done! I really enjoyed both of them.
Great poem. It is very original in style and I particularly like the italicised parts. Well written!
Silverfish poem a clever idea - liked the italicised break with the letters eaten away.
Pun in second poem was a gift and you worded it perfectly!
hopeeternal
Ugh- silverfish! As much as I don't like them you actually made them appealing in this very clever poem! And I really like the little poem!
Both of these poems were great! Good stuff!
Wonderful, wonderful! What great humorous poems! My lips definitely twitched and ended up in a smile!
"Words are turning themselves
into insects and crawling off the page
They mock me in slow anagrammatic dance"
Nicely done! Enjoyed.
Happy Poetry Thursday!
lisa
Very funny. I really got an image in my head of the buggers literally eating your words ;)
I love both of these -- they are very creative and funny.
oh, great fun, both!
Great fun--I did smile, with pleasure. Loved the whittled language of the silverfish and their own poetry.
You are brilliant! I love these poems. With the silverfish one, I love the image of them eating your words and also shitting them out -- this is superb imagery. And also how you played with the words between the stanzas. And the poem from the random prompt generator is terrific -- I love the image of the row of birds like an abacus.
:)
My favorite is the second: pithy and epigrammatic. Nice!
I love the "flock and abacus" poem!
So clever, with the play on words...one would never guess its "random" origin!
I love your photo!
The poems are both great. You have a way of turning things this way and that, and of picking out the quirky aspects.
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