Best Parsnip Poems
Crisp end of winter morning,
my shovel digs the soil,
turning over weeds and worms,
and watch them twist and coil …
hoe the dirt once more again,
until a soft and silky bed,
then plant seeds, where once grew weeds,
and grow vegetables instead.
Watch out for snails!
Watch out for slugs!
Watch out for earwigs!
Watch out for harlequin bugs!
In two weeks or a little more,
shoots of green grow from the seeds,
now fighting for their patch of ground,
but a little later than - the weeds.
And so I’m down upon my knees,
working out what plant is what;
making sure carrot and parsnip,
are growers in this garden plot.
Watch out for sparrows!
Watch out for silver eyes!
Watch out for blackbirds!
Watch out for magpies!
Summer sun and drying winds;
summer storms with chance of hail.
Caterpillars, thrips and aphis,
do their best to have me fail,
but murder - mayhem travel well,
with snail bait, dusts and poison spray,
scarecrows, nets and old wine casks,
to keep marauding birds at bay.
Watch out for virus’!
Watch out for rot!
Watch out for mildew!
Watch out for black spot!
Late summer, autumn and the plants
are looking rather worn.
The leaves are dry, stems are dead,
as nature typifies her scorn,
for death will come with winter cold,
but thankfully the harvest flesh,
has been worth the season trials,
to dine on garden fresh.
Categories:
parsnip, garden,
Form:
Rhyme
I SHUDDER TO THINK
I shudder to think about the way
Some vegetables are abused every day -
With physical and psychological slights
In gross violation of their vegetable rights.
Handicapped vegetables have no chance to fight back
Like eyeless potatoes - poor blind mites,
And baby carrots , aaw! Or peas-in-a-pod,
Eaten before they’re even born and take a breath.
Imagine those frantic runnerbeans
Desperately trying to escape.
No surprise that peas are strained.
My over-tired mum used to say, “Oh, I’m shredded.”
So I understand how tired shredded-cabbage must feel.
What about the potatoes who diced with death and lost?
Jerusalem Artichokes - “chokes” is horrible!
Why not “Jerusalem Passes Aways” ?
And ”Squash” ! - Please speak more politely:
What a way to go - we should say “Press Lightly”.
No wonder some clean-living veg are angry :
Parsnip - an angry snip from parson or clergy;
Swede resembling a tall blond person, Stockholm based;
With horrid ethnic humour ( bad taste)
Like sauerkraut (also bad taste)
(So-called humour about a surly German).
Look at insults basd on vegetables for a human -
“The IQ of a cabbage.” What ethnicity insults !
I’m sorry for tomatoes - all this veg talk results
In them being called a vegetable dish
It’s like calling Scots people English.
Sheer vegetable racism is the worst. Mixed potato and carrot salad?
Not in apartheid South Africa – their salad had to be pallid.
Oh yes some veg are spoiled like children :
Coddled cauliflower warmed in milk ; then
Brazed egg-plants (please call snobby ones aubergines)
Suntanned slowly at their leisure;
And butter (not margarine) beans cooked with pleasure.
It’s too horrible entirely, the abuse is complete
I’ll stop being vegetarian, and start eating meat.
Categories:
parsnip, funny
Form:
Couplet
It’s very cold outside but not in here
Where I am relaxing and sipping beer
Reading all the latest poems
That everyone else has been composing
They really warm up my toes
As well as my big red nose
Just don’t stop what you are doing
As this new recipe from you and who
Means that I might just add a parsnip or two
For my own Best Winter Soup
But don’t let that ever stop you
To refine your own recipe too
Because there is so much talent and friendship here
I wish you all a Happy New Year
DAMO
x
Categories:
parsnip, appreciation, encouraging, thanks,
Form:
Free verse
The ABCs of Things Green
Algae, alligator, artichoke, asparagus, aphids, Andradite,
Brussels sprouts, broccoli, Buffalo Treehopper, and beans,
Cuckoo Wasp, Cabbage, cucumber, Common Green Darner, and celery
Dog Day Cicada, Delphinium flowers diopside and dioptase, (rocks),
Emeralds, eyes, endive, evergreen trees, Emerald Ash Borer, Epidote
Ferns, Forests, Frogs, Fungus, Fork-tailed Bush Katydids, and fushite
Green Macaw, Green Jay, green onions, green bottles and boxes
Honeydew melons, Habanera chilies, and Hellebore,
Indian peas, Irish moss, Iceberg lettuce, Ivy, and Iguanas,
Jade vine, Jack-in-the-pulpit, Jade, and the Jolly Green Giant
Kale kelp, katydid, kiwi fruit, kohlrabi, and the Keel Billed Toucan’s bill,
Leeks, lemons, limes, leaf hoppers, leafy greens, and Leprechauns,
Mint jelly, Magnolia, Green Jumping Spider, Morrisonite Jasper, Malachite
New Zealand spinach, Napa cabbage, the Nile River, and Nephrite Jade,
Olives, Ostrich fern, okra, Oak leaf lettuce, olive Sparrow and onion,
Praying Mantis, peas, potato, parsnip, Peach-faced Lovebird, and Prehnite,
Question is, What green thing starts with Q? Some quarks do.
Runner-beans, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, Rose quartz, and Rue,
Saddleback Caterpillars, Southern Emerald Moths, snow peas, Serpentine
Tadpole, Turtle, Turf, Turnip greens, Turaco, and Toxic Torbenite,
Unripe bananas and Ugli fruit (both are green then orange)
Velvet Beans, Vidalia Onions, Vegetable leaves, Varovite, and Varisite
White-winged Parakeet, watercress, winter purslane, and wild leek
Xigua melon is a yummy treat
Yellow onions, Yellow-chevroned parakeet, Yellow-green vireo, and yarrow,
Zuchini is the last, but not the least of the ABC’s of Things Green.
Categories:
parsnip, bird, food, fruit,
Form:
Abecedarian
Others think my hair
wild, untamed,
needing a coif
when all about me the wind
rustles
through the fallen leaves…
red on gold,
stamped brown,
ethereal...
substance once there,
gone
like soup
cooked for hours
to fight the chill,
tang of parsnip…
that’s the visible crop,
bushy froth
while beneath soil,
fight
the war
for a strand or lock or two
of my being...
heart untied from children
hands freed
to tap or zizzle a bow
across strings
what a jumble it all is
after the clean
prepped
pampered
soul is emptied
scraped down to metal
my hair
unwound into myself
swelling
as if a clogged pore
and I’m wondering...
is there is any
who know
how I look
undressed.
Categories:
parsnip, body, clothes, color, earth,
Form:
Free verse
black snakeroot, yew, cocklebur, poison (ivy, oak, parsnip, sumac, ryegrass, hemlock), blister bushes, daffodil, mayapple, lilium, jerusalem cherry, indian licorice, deadly nightshade, christmas rose, bleeding heart, asparagus berries, wolfsbane, tomato leaves, doll’s eyes, the suicide tree, young larkspur, blue-green algae, stinkweed, dumbcane, european spindle, blind-your-eye mangrove, manchineel, laburnum, mother of millions, elderberry root, bacterial pathogens, exotoxins, mycotoxins, grayanotoxins, rhinovirus, chicken pox, sleeping sickness, cholera, yellow fever, typhoid, rotavirus, river blindness, measles, japanese encephalitis, hepatitis (a,b & c), cryptosporidiosis, shigella infection, pneumonia, meningitis, tuberculosis, schistosomiasis, malaria, influenza, herpes (1 & 2), crab louse, scabies, chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis, chancroid, trichomoniasis, hpv, hiv/aids, ebola virus, marburg virus, mad cow disease, mudslides, avalanches, blizzards, storms, cyclones, hurricanes, tsunamis, tornadoes, earthquakes, floods, fires, supervolcanic eruptions: evidence of absence.
Categories:
parsnip, life,
Form:
Free verse
no more small talk to say in numbers walking the trail
and these are added up and equal now us on the mountain marsh exploring
in the mind's eye glittering
like water oozing quicksilvers under this yellow sun
like my breath in time's undulating tides beckoning thankyou
and so I bow before your respect and seeing
in hopes of holding a memory forever in deepness
and high your appreciation is the knowing stillness spreading through the veins of a universal
creature
as named fireweed as cow parsnip as
the seeds and sacred black and nourishing soil supporting the perfect desire I am witnessing
now in You
a sensitivity that can touch this quivering truth as a leaf cradles sunbeams in joy and
in reverence
and grows whole
with cycles called days and years as quick as these tattering turned pages we have caught up
with ourselves in
time and tomorrows and pinwheels of planets and stars and the revolution around our center
creaking slowing toward halt toward
knowing
the primordial morning of my arm around you standing once again at the beginning
older than friends watching sunrises
with the feeling of gravity evaporated into the air and events in time flow behind
as sure as step into the slip so cold rushing stream washes silvery slick mud spread thick
from our toes hands arms and our skin your face becoming clean again and sparkling in the
light
Categories:
parsnip, nature
Form:
Free verse
I'd rather be inside doing the baking
Than the one being baked outside in the sun.
I never learned how to barbecue,
As my Dad ran away when I was only two.
Though my Mum taught me how to shoot for the pot,
Which really hit the spot,
As I could do that without seeing a single sun spot.
My Possum is really quite delicious,
Even if slightly malicious.
I have a habit of making a stew out of rabbit.
Visitors are big on anything made from pig.
It would be a mistake to miss my venison steak,
Or duck out without some roast duck.
My ham and eggs are never green, though quite lean.
Mushroom soup with homemade bread will keep you fed
Til the rest of the food is prepared
You can grub for hu hu grubs for me to roast on sticks.
My roast parsnip contains no arsenic.
I don't have to tout for my trout.
Or make a deal for a pie made of eel.
You can make a toast while I tend to the roast.
Or if you prefer give the gravy a stir.
I won't get cross if you give the salad a toss.
Or set the table if you are able.
We can talk while you find me a fork.
Afterwards I will let you judge my fudge.
If you can still budge.
And I will find some liquor that is still pure.
My apple pie with cream piled high is really worth a try.
Pears with homemade wine are quite divine.
I have an art for the apricot tart.
And you won't get over my Pavlova.
I bake my cakes with fresh eggs which seems to please the hens.
Our honey is worth the money
And our jams are in favour for their flavour.
I produce a cheese that aims to please.
My biscuits soon stray from the tray.
If you want any thing more fancy we can look in the pantry.
With skin cancer on the rise, I think I am wise
In getting up early to watch my bread rise.
Though I am still game to go outside with my gun by my side.
But when the sun starts to hurt the eye,
My oven goes back on high for when you come by.
If you stay the night you can dance under moonlight
And wish upon a star from afar outside of a car.
Wouldn't that be more fun than going out in the mid-day sun.
With your true face scared to be exposed.
Categories:
parsnip, art, beauty, celebration, change,
Form:
Personification
Vegetables
A huddle of potatoes on a plate
Called to the beans, “You're late, you're late.”
As all the peas hopped round about.
While a lonely carrot waltzed a sprout,
Then the beans came one by one,
Eager to frolic and join the fun.
A baritone artichoke sang a song
As a lively aubergine danced along.
Until a parsnip and a swede
Gave the call, “It’s time to feed”.
Then a fork and a spoon
Slowly came into the room.
A giant cavern opened wide
And all the vegetables danced inside.
Barry Stebbings
8/4/2016
Categories:
parsnip, food, humorous,
Form:
Light Verse
Talk turkey; talk turkey
It's Thanksgiving day.
Fill up your mouths
the Thanksgiving way.
Gobble down; gobble down
meat and red berries.
Some adding gravy
for flavour that varies.
White mashed potatoes
hollowed in boats.
Filled with yellow butter
that warms 'till it floats.
Turnip and parsnip
mixed in together.
Tangy mild flavour
that lasts forever.
Green tiny peas
piled on the side;
covered in butter
in tears they have cried.
All for the price of a prayer
to say thanks
and gathering our friends
in a place that is nice.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Categories:
parsnip, faith, food, holiday, thanksgiving,
Form:
Couplet
This poem was inspired by the interviews by Earl K. Pollon and S. S. Matheson conducted with native Sekanni peoples who were negatively effected by the flooding of their communal homelands by the building of the W.A.C. Bennett Dam. “This Was Our Valley” tells that story of injustice. 640 square miles of riverfront and hunting territory would be flooded to form Williston Lake. The Sekanni peoples were driven from their ancestral homeland in northeastern British Columbia, Canada and dispersed.
The Shopping Cart Injustice
People, place and spirit
All were our relations
Biopeds, quadrupeds, winged or finned -
River language told us so.
Fishing rocks spoke the run
Where the riffles and the rapids talked.
Ancestors, dead and alive, told living stories where
Running the river banks, the children played.
The land was a book written in forms.
We made our mark with love, community
Fishing weirs, aspen dugout canoes,
Hunting trails, camps and sacred sites.
Always traders, we traded furs with
White settlers when they arrived
On the rivers Parsnip, Finlay and Peace at
Finlay Forks, Fort Grahame, Fort McLeod.
We added pack trains, teams of pack horses
River freighters, flat bottom ‘longboats’
For supplies and for mail delivery.
It seemed that we could live together.
Then one day a government agent said
That shopping carts were coming
They would flood our world
Water rising everywhere
Shopping carts with electric can openers
Full, fast to check out,
Shopping carts with electric hair blowers,
Full, faster to check out,
Shopping carts with electric air conditioners,
Full, fastest to check out
Shopping carts with electric stoves.
Check out, check out, check out.
They would make our rivers into a lake
We would move or drown.
Our elders did not believe it.
That was the only consultations!
Soon Saskatoon berries all under water
Next, the banks sloughed back to graveyards
Next, cliffs crumbled, and banks fell into rising lake
Houses of the villages slipped and floated
Coffins, bones and bodies strewed the shore
Where tangled trees, debris and more
Eddied with flotsam in the wind.
We wept for our ancestors!
We weep for our children.
We had to flee the destruction
Caused by tree grinders, D-9 bull dozers
The dam construction.
Now they want to take more
Another dam for more shopping carts.
Please stop Site ‘C’.
Categories:
parsnip, environment, history,
Form:
Free verse
Mongrel mongeese can fly at very high altitudes but dome headed calves cannot as they must wait until they are 672 years old. Fly fly flight then. Oh great. See how the waving whales chanting circulating wisdom in a foam. And bathing basking. The hypothesis of a 5minute triangle is a good idea for a specific dialect to be spoken. The noises of a parsnip parsonage swell. Ingest not a seabird sandwich. Opening in a cave a smugglers' house. Housekeeping in a coven. Hahahaha dripped fondling fig figurehead fantastic fakery. Hahahaha and a mealworm singing opera to a friend of a prawn cocktail. Weary wearing weather. Washing. Xxxx gastronomically z z c y g z
Categories:
parsnip, assonance, baseball,
Form:
FLIGHTS OF FANCY PHRASIS 3
Blossom of baby's breath,soft white
gorse,crusted yellow, weeping willow
rush patterned lace pastures a pastel green.
Buttercup,daisy&comely cowslip mingle
&mix in fellowship swaying pelts of grass
with purple vetch & ribwort plantain,clover
in English rain.Scabious,burnets butteflies
and bees hawthorn and scented woodruff.
Briar brambles sprawl,in dogrose so tall
above harts-tongue.
Seabank with scattered seaweed &
feathery fennel in aniseed;Alexander’s
leaves so green this tender cusine.
Welcome wholesome fat hen,vibrant
shoots the vimen in Lamb’s lettuce
in Jack-in-the-hedge in wild radish,
cress&chive,where majoram &sweet
cicely thrive.Seabeet,and chard also survive.
Wild parsnip the confectioner,tansy to savour.
Stinging nettles so green,peppermint oil
pick-me-up, in coltsfoot syrup cup.
From Flights of Fancy 2003
Listen to me recite this part phrasis on youtube under my pen name ichthys chiro
Categories:
parsnip, fantasy,
Form:
Verse
Brocolli and bacon soup
parsley risotto
casserole of artichokes
cheese celeriac
beetroot cake & cream
parsnip wine
try !
Categories:
parsnip, food
Form:
Epulaeryu
while walking down the grocery isle
I heard a parsnip
scream out help
I thought
oh no
I need help
is this the end
I should call a friend
then the parsnip did it again
help
help me
down under the parsnip bin
the door was jammed
all I could see was a clerk’s hand
set me free
he said to me
I was relieved but he was
still shaking as I helped him up
he reached into the parsnip bin and
grabbed a huge parsnip
ran over to a blender
popped it in and
as it was chopped into bits
smiled wide-eyed and said
that is the last time that Parsnip is going to do that
to me
Categories:
parsnip, fun,
Form:
Free verse