Best Licorice Poems
You taste as if twilight were—
lavender swirling like smoke from the earth
licorice lingering with the full moon’s soft pull
a sweetness both dark and divine.
Your skin sparkles with starlight
electric and soft as moth wings.
We sip the pink sky
lemonade lakes cascade through our fingers
time unspools between our hands
while the past drinks from our open palms.
The air crackles with floating florets
each breath a promise, unspoken but heard.
If love were a color it'd be you—
violet and velvet
honey and slow-mountain dew
the universe holds its breath;
galaxies halt their ancient waltz
as they struggle to name us.
And if forever had a flavor
it would stain my tongue—
sweet, dark, endless—
a love so vast
even creation forgets what came before it.
We are the first poem ever written
and the last song left unsung
our love the verse that never fades—
Just like lavender licorice and lemonade lakes.
Happy pumpkins
Apple dumplings
Licorice sticks
Lollipops to lick
Owls hooting
Witches looting
Emerald city dreams
Every Halloween
Needling together fun things
Muddy Water's Gramma gave us licorice
I walked the old Kenwood neighborhood with my twin little brother and sister in tow,
'hold there hands and look both ways before you cross the street'
No use trying to talk my way out, knew it was the only way mom would let me go.
October's new moon, peaked in and out of passing clouds,
leaving the night gloomy in stygian darkness.
Faces painted, carrying our paper bags, dressed in raggedy linen pillow case shrouds.
Low sad sound of a guitar's slow lick, pitch in open E, played a few doors down,
accompanied by a soulful song sung:
'Well, my mother told my father,
just before hmmm, I was born,
"I got a boy child's comin,
He's gonna be, he's gonna be a rollin stone,
Sure 'nough, he's a rollin stone..'
I knocked on the door, our shrilled chorus trio called out Trick or Treater's round,
Clutching a Bible in her hands 'to ward off evil spirits'.
Gramma Della turned on the porch-light, framed in screened doorway,
emitting a joyous whooping sort of laugh, invited the three of us in.
The bright-eyed man sat at the kitchen table, looking up from his guitar emblazoned in Formica reflected glory.
In the corner, a pretty girl, dressed as Cinderella, sat cross-legged on the floor..
with what looked like a million dollars worth of candy.
Muddy, who had ceased his song at our knock, nodded our way.
With curious smile that was both happy and sad, in smooth, measured voice said
'Oh don't you look a fright'.
Della handed out licorice that year, the same as all the years we once knew.
But what us kids remember best, and last, the man who sung & played the Catfish Blues.
What I didn't learn 'til later, a picture placed in Muddy's view of the living room.
Little Walter, with his harmonica cupped in hands,
who died just a year earlier, a day after Valentine's moon.
Inspired by McKinley Morganfield and his Grandmother Della Jones
You get a heck of a sound from the church. Can't you hear it in my voice? -Muddy Waters
In New York and so many places,
Chocolate shops abound,
Where milk and dark and white, with nuts
Or not, can all be found.
Yet here in Sweden, there's a store,
If you want something sweet,
Which carries only licorice,
A Nordic candy treat.
Varieties are plentiful,
Including those with salt,
Which you may want to spit right out;
If so, it's not your fault.
For licorice, the jet black kind,
You either love or hate.
I love it but when made with salt,
I simply can't relate.
Yet other combinations,
Like with chocolate or fruit,
Taste delicious and they come in
Different styles and shapes, to boot.
Today, my last in Sweden,
I stocked up to take back home,
So I'm leaving with sweet mem'ries
And the topic for a poem!
Labeled as a healthful
Legume, this root is sweet
Like sugar, but with a
Long-lasting, stronger taste!
Lollipop licks of it
Linger on my tongue. I
Love its unique flavor!
April 15, 2017 for Kim Merryman's Pleiades L Contest
I love love love Licorice!!!
The ice-cream store sign read, “Unique Sensation!”
A tantalizing twist in a strange combination.
What were they thinking creating that dish?
An eerie concoction of black licorice.
It sounded like such an intriguing new taste.
Vanilla cream mixed with a black swirling paste.
Soon after devouring my delectable cone,
I flashed a big smile, and the damage was shown.
The customers cringed at the horrible sight,
as if I were haunting their Halloween night.
I looked in the mirror at the dark hefty toll,
inside of my mouth had become black as coal.
It looked pretty bad, I couldn’t deny,
as if I were poisoned by black liquid dye.
I often consider why that flavor didn’t last,
why it dropped from the list so incredibly fast.
Perhaps all the screams, or the outspoken cries.
Perhaps from the laughter in onlookers eyes.
But, likely it was, when the workday was done,
they counted the sales, which totaled just one.
Should it ever return, that flavor so fine,
you know I’ll be back to be first-one-in-line.
Until then I’m satisfied simply to dream,
of that flavor called Licorice Voodoo ice-cream.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Licorice Voodoo is the first poem-story I ever wrote. It is based on an experience as a kid,
when my Mom used to take me to get licorice ice-cream that no one else liked. I still look for
it, ... have never see it again.
The Twizzlers that I eat are red.
They’re great, but what they lack
Is that special flavor that’s reserved
For licorice that’s black.
I bought a yard of it when on
An Italy vacation.
To Twizzlers this stuff only has
A very slight relation.
For Italians love their anise
So their candy is imbued
With the punch this seed does carry
And its matching attitude.
I could kick myself, believe me,
‘Cause I only bought a yard
And when it is gone, the loss of it
Will hit me very hard.
Once upon a licorice stick, I pondered
While dancing on a thistle protruding
After my paycheck I duly squandered
So poor was me wound up concluding
‘Tis not very wise to waste my nickels
Like a drunken, unmindful profligate
On silly baubles, sodas, and popsicles,
I’m not a rich Far Eastern potentate.
When lastly, I could afford only licorice
Living impoverished with nary a thing
My attitude becoming rather bitterish
My entire legacy being a piece of string!
Written August 4, 2022
There is no candy more lonely
Than a stick of licorice
It's a love hate affair where you do or don't care
That doesn't dare come with a makeup kiss
You can chew on that fact some think nasty at best
While some smile with blackened teeth
You either do or you don't, will or you won't
Think licorice is a scrumpdillyicious treat
Oil stained wings of satin sea,
Ebon quills on blue,
Ruffled whispers, jasmine
breeze,
Echoes of near silent who.
Dripping onyx, puddled, pooled,
Sheets of satin overhead,
Licorice melted, inky glow,
Shadows in spirit and bed.
Silver wisps, shimmer pale,
Hiding from the dawn,
Flames, charcoal sapphire,
Queens lonely pawn.
Interrupted, endless oblivion,
A tease, nothing more,
Luminescent twinkle of
innocence,
Muse of legend and lore.
Strewn and scattered,
imperfect rhyme,
Reason without shame,
Glitter sprinkled, heavy hand,
Never ending game.
Struggling for the top of bill,
Eager to compete,
Diamonds in the dusky rough,
Carbon parted by heat.
Drizzle, navy and tar reprise,
Metallic freckles of light,
Wishes, dreams and
introspect,
Twinkle on, star bright.
Liquid kisses from licorice lips
Onyx lover with thick heavy hips
Vivid love language lavender whiffs
Ebony clouds of hair at finger tips
Throw yourself on a time bomb
howling, breaking the words,
twisting the letters, reciting a prayer
after the rise of a monomania in the
face of mankind.
I am becoming poorer everyday
by grace of filth all around. Cannot hear
myself now in the marching band of curses
and abuse; a scion hides a fawn from
the eyes of wild bulls.
A hierarchy of buried skeletons, spineless
dinosaurs lying under the shadows of technicolor
maps and letting freeze the time. The music
was lapped by passersby. The world
was moving in circle.
Satish Verma
Throw yourself on a time bomb
howling, breaking the words,
twisting the letters, reciting a prayer
after the rise of a monomania in the
face of mankind.
I am becoming poorer everyday
by grace of filth all around. Cannot hear
myself now in the marching band of curses
and abuse; a scion hides a fawn from
the eyes of wild bulls.
A hierarchy of buried skeletons, spineless
dinosaurs lying under the shadows of technicolor
maps and letting freeze the time. The music
was lapped by passersby. The world
was moving in circle.
Satish Verma
(Senryus about crushes)
I'd never say to
a guy "Oh, and by the way,
have a crush on you."
I'd never stalk my
crush on the Internet - that's
what our friends are for.
Never let a guy
treat you like licorice - you're
a red gummy bear.
Black licorice stick tastes very good.
Each day for three weeks ate all she could.
How dumb could she be?
Very dumb was she —
with its toxicity like wormwood.
4/29/2021