The following works netted me third runner-up in the Philolexian Society's 2005 Alfred Joyce Kilmer Memorial Bad Poetry Contest. Third runner-up in any contest is already a dubious distinction; more so in this contest, because on the one hand there were quite a lot of entrants, and on the other hand my prize was “ice balls”, those colored plastic water-filled spheres that you freeze and put in cold drinks instead of ice cubes so as to avoid slowly adulterating them. If that isn't a cheesy metaphor screaming to be used in next year's contest, I don't know what is.

See? There's bad poetry everywhere. To write it, one only needs view the world through a pair of mustard-colored glasses.

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Girl from Nantucket
Tired of your crap limericks
Prefers haiku, thanks.

Three poems in the style of Ogden Nash

I. The Punther

Ogden Nash writes like a poet,
Except tersely, so you can stow it.
Should you behold a Nash oeuvre,
Prepare to swevre.
Better yet, if you've a question for Nash,
Don't ash.

II. New York Real Estate

Often newcomers find that space is an issue.
To be able to turn around or stretch without punching a neighbor's wall might wissue.
But look on the bright side: at least when you're home potential visitors can't missue.
Too large a flat and when your spouse goes on an errand on his or her way out he or she won't go to the effort to find and kissue.
Besides, you can make anyplace livable with a dash of creativity,
Or by purchasing expensive contraptions designed to add livity,
Or by holding a very small housewarming party and relying on guests' givity,
Or, for those with a practical bent, oblivity.
Rich folk keep spare houses in Connecticut,
But you can't just go off and buy one, it's bad etiquette,
Unless you have the requisite breeding as predicate.
Does it truly matter? You betticate.
And the commute? Forgetticate.
In summary, if you want to live in the city it's a matter of dealing with small apartments and don't even think about houses,
You've done well if you don't sleep directly atop your neatly folded trousers.

III. Reflections on Modern Prosperity

Dutch
Is clutch
But English
Is blinglish.

Ode from a Grecian Urn

O please, doth chill out. I'm a fucking urn.
O geez, I think that was pentameter.
Goddammit. See, you're messing with my head!
Alone, I'd never mastered metric foot;
Your florid verse has elbowed its way in
And now I feel an ass. No, not that way,
Don't be a perv. I don't have any hands
Or really any apparatus for
The sensing of sensations in that sense.
What's worse, I sense I lack your sense of rhyme.