Soup Fork at the Banquet of Verbs
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| thoughtco |
Soup Fork at the Banquet of Verbs
Stitching time's ankles together
Painting by numbers with invisible paint
One hand tied behind the metaphor
Both feet in the punchline
Tongue in cheek, cheek in flame
Whistling past the graveyard of grammar
Juggling chainsaws in oven mitts
Beating a dead cliché back to life
Soup fork at a banquet of verbs
Smoke signals in a hurricane
A compass allergic to north
All hat, no cattle
The emperor’s new enjambment
A bad idea in a borrowed tuxedo
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I hated this poem shortly after I wrote it.
Because here’s the thing: I’m the guy constantly nagging my fellow poets—especially the poor souls in my workshop group who endure my lectures—that poems are built from sentences. Sentences deserve grammar. Syntax. Structure. Punctuation. The bones of language.
So a poem that was basically a stylish pile of incomplete sentences was… irritating. Deeply irritating.
Until someone looked at it and said, “Yeah, but those would make great titles.”
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Wonderful example of the form and I love ‘ Shadowboxing with syntax’ 🙌
ReplyDeleteGreat read, Bravo
ReplyDeleteMuch love
Every line totally engaging but I especially dig the allergic compass. Congrats
ReplyDeleteStunning lines, turning language inside out.
ReplyDeleteA playground of phrases that makes me dizzy, like being pushed on a merry go-round.
ReplyDeleteI was immediately taken by the title, Chris, and got a buzz from this well-crafted poem. It was hard to choose favourite lines, but I really like the thought of ‘herding cats through a thesaurus’, ‘shadowboxing with syntax’ and a ‘bad idea in a borrowed tuxedo’.
ReplyDeletewhat a delightful poem
ReplyDeleteChris, this is wonderful! I agree that it’s hard to choose a favorite. One I got a kick out of: “Cart before the horse, horse on sabbatical”
ReplyDeleteSo many cool metaphors! Nicely done 👏
ReplyDelete