|
Notices |
It's been a while, Unregistered -- Welcome back to Eratosphere! |
|
|
10-14-2022, 06:13 AM
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: May 2013
Location: England, UK
Posts: 5,136
|
|
Since the rubric seems to be shifting a little, here's an old and, so it turned out, unprophetic, one of mine. It doesn't fit the original brief, but there's definitely homonyms involved.
A million, billion trumpets
At first he had only heard the sound of a single trumpet
that blew as he entered a room. Not some plastic trumpet
playing cheap, wobbly notes, and certainly not a trumpet
in the scatological sense, no, the very best kind of trumpet,
the kind that presaged the presence of a king, or a trumpet
made of gold and blown in fanfare by an angel trumpeting
the arrival of the Lord. But when he’d looked for a trumpet,
he couldn’t find one; the room was empty, with no trumpet-
blower in sight. Could it be that he was hearing trumpets
as others heard voices? Might this be the first wild trumpet-
call of madness? And yet, even if it were, the trumpeting
had felt good, and it had seemed so fitting to be trumpeted
into a room. So he was pleased when later the trumpeting
recurred. He quickly grew accustomed to being trumpeted,
and soon it was as if he had always heard the blast of a trumpet
heralding his entries and exits, and before long the solo trumpet
became two, then three, then a whole platoon of trumpets
proclaimed his every action. Now there were trumpets
to herald his first movements of morning, there were trumpets
to undress to in the evening, and even when he trumpeted
in the scatological sense, there was a crescendo of trumpets
to celebrate his achievement. He learned from the trumpets
that everything he did was laudable, praiseworthy, trumpetable,
something he had long suspected even before the trumpets
had arrived to confirm it. Such was the volume of the trumpets
that sometimes when others spoke all he heard was trumpets,
and even his own thoughts were replaced by the sound of trumpets;
yet he saw no real disadvantage in this – often the trumpets
made more sense to him, and besides when the trumpets
erupted within he felt invincible: as long he had those trumpets
blowing, whatever the adversity, he felt sure he could trump it.
Elevation to high office only strengthened this feeling, and trumpets
began to blow continuously in an unending fanfare of trumpetry:
every breath, every word, every thought, triumphantly trumpeted.
Now he knew there was no challenge, no enemy he couldn’t trump. It
occurred to him he was the best leader ever. Yes! sang the trumpets.
It looked a bit like a trumpet. A big red button-shaped trumpet.
Shall we, my trumpets? he asked. You the man! blasted the trumpets.
He pushed the big red trumpet to an orgasmic explosion of trumpets.
|
10-14-2022, 08:39 AM
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Jun 2001
Location: New York
Posts: 16,627
|
|
My favorite patch of monorhyme in any poem comes at the end of Lewis Carroll's "The Aged Aged Man." The final stanza has 12 rhymes in a row beginning with "I weep . . . " And somehow the 12 lines of monorhyme don't stop you from hearing the weight/gate rhyme that brackets the 12 lines:
And now, if e'er by chance I put
My fingers into glue,
Or madly squeeze a right-hand foot
Into a left-hand shoe,
Or if I drop upon my toe
A very heavy weight,
I weep, for it reminds me so
Of that old man I used to know—
Whose look was mild, whose speech was slow,
Whose hair was whiter than the snow,
Whose face was very like a crow,
With eyes, like cinders, all aglow,
Who seemed distracted with his woe,
Who rocked his body to and fro,
And muttered mumblingly and low,
As if his mouth were full of dough,
Who snorted like a buffalo—
That summer evening long ago
A-sitting on a gate.
Last edited by Roger Slater; 10-14-2022 at 09:07 AM.
|
10-14-2022, 09:25 PM
|
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Posts: 6,801
|
|
Matt,
I heard trumpets all night! This sorta reminds me of a goofy joke my father liked to say (it was funny to a toddler):
I bought a wooden whistle, but it wouldn't whistle,
so then I bought a steel whistle, but it still wouldn't whistle,
then I bought a tin whistle, and now I tin whistle.
__________________
Ralph
|
10-15-2022, 09:54 AM
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: San Diego, CA, USA
Posts: 8,513
|
|
|
10-16-2022, 02:50 AM
|
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Brooklyn, NY USA
Posts: 6,119
|
|
Yikes!!! What a linguistic furbelow. I want to include a Bigalow.
Last edited by Allen Tice; 10-16-2022 at 08:41 AM.
Reason: Typo
|
10-16-2022, 03:48 PM
|
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Posts: 6,801
|
|
Maybe influenced by the heading “Sitting on a corn flake” by Jim Moonan over on Art Museum.
Little Things
Sat on a bee
slept on a pea
it tickled me
Choked on dog hair
shaved Rover
thought it fair
Splashed by a puddle
and bit an eggshell
I could still yodel
Chewing meat gristle
and stung by a thistle
I happily whistle
Learning my lover
eloped to Dover
I cried, Where’s Rover?
__________________
Ralph
|
10-16-2022, 03:49 PM
|
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Posts: 6,801
|
|
Sorry, 'twas a hiccup?
__________________
Ralph
Last edited by RCL; 10-16-2022 at 04:51 PM.
|
09-06-2024, 06:18 PM
|
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Posts: 6,801
|
|
I see that back in '22 I ended this with a whimper. Sorry. This is, I hope, better than those.
In the Dark
While wandering in the dark
Through an oak-tree park
Surrounding blackness stark
I whistle for a lark
Shrink at a nearby bark
But often in the dark
And like a sea-lost barque
I'm shadowed by a shark
Yet know without the dark
There’d never be a spark
__________________
Ralph
Last edited by RCL; 09-07-2024 at 01:54 PM.
|
09-06-2024, 10:38 PM
|
Member
|
|
Join Date: Mar 2024
Location: Anchorage, AK
Posts: 468
|
|
Right
Put a “W” in front of right
to spell my surname right.
I’m over here, on the right.
I think I have the right
to stand where I want—right
here is a good place, right?
|
|
|
Thread Tools |
|
Display Modes |
Linear Mode
|
Posting Rules
|
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
HTML code is Off
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Member Login
Forum Statistics:
Forum Members: 8,451
Total Threads: 22,252
Total Posts: 275,334
There are 1147 users
currently browsing forums.
Forum Sponsor:
|
|
|
|
|
|