Best Varmints Poems
but i wouldn’t fault you words spilling from a loose connection
i forgive the negative
they are tied to your artistic temperament
your heart
translucent
exposes wires tattered and frayed
a myriad of internal cuts and bruises
i can hold such damage
with barely a touch
soothe the gnawing of varmints uninvited
draw out a collage of smiles
patiently waiting to adorn
the you i see
i can draw your laughter
deep and resounding
i can love you unconditionally
for better or for worse
be that handy little light
one carries to duel the dark
Thu Mar 5 2020
Categories:
varmints, angst, anxiety, blessing, character,
Form:
Free verse
The death of winter carries varied sights.
In April, when dandelions roar, “It’s Spring!”
green yards transform by magic overnight.
Gramps had sprayed his lawn, but in ours weeds bring
an old game for kids as they dance and swing.
Small windmills in disguise, children spread seeds
giving Grandpa a cause for some dismay.
He is no grouch, fence conversation leads
to friendly talk of butterflies at play -
riddles about what nature does in May.
The kids amazed, watch squirrels building nests,
questions evolve about the birds and bees.
Gramps calls them varmints - Mother's Nature’s pests.
“Ask your folks”, he replies with cough and wheeze.
In naptime dreams, he aims a gun at trees.
Gramps takes a walk, golf umbrella hovers
for spring rains do not announce their coming.
A neighbor lady hobbles to cover.
Listen, his cane on her sidewalk - drumming,
sweet songs of spring love, two voices humming.
written May 7, 2014, edited on May 25, 2014
Categories:
varmints, spring,
Form:
Quintain (English)
"Happy Easter To You!", is the greeting I hear them shout!
Alas, I just lamely roost here, brood, ponder and pout!
I've worked for weeks making eggs and I'm all tuckered out!
All this hoopla about rabbits, I can really do without!
Me, my mom, aunts, nieces and innumerable distant cousins,
Have been producing eggs by the gross and by the dozens.
Every Easter 'tis those wily bunnies earning the gratitude,
Leaving me and my kin with a very fractious attitude!
Moms send their kids to rob the eggs from 'neath our breast,
Telling them the rabbits made them - this I vehemently protest!
I'm thinking of a sitdown strike come Lent next year,
To frustrate those crafty varmints with a message loud and clear!
The kids make appalling designs on the beauties we produce,
And even tint our chicks in lurid hues, adding to the abuse!
The rabbits get all the glory and stir up all this commotion!
They don't lay eggs! I'll disabuse folks of that silly notion!
If I sound somewhat frustrated, well I reckon I am,
As those cunning scoundrels perpetuate their mythical scam!
Us chickens will just have to press on with our usual grace.
The truth will out, then we'll "cluckle" at the egg on their face!
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
(© All Rights Reserved)
Placed No. 3 in A Chicken Poem In Memory of Armano Aurocano Rock Star
Categories:
varmints, funnyeaster, easter,
Form:
Rhyme
To all you varmints
Who like to squeeze the Charmin's
I went to the grocery store one day
And someone had the Charmin's squeezing away
I said hey what are you doing that for
Like come on right in the store
She looked at me like i was spun
Like it was something i had ever done
So i gave a little squeeze to see how she liked it
Another women saw me and started having a fit
Hey she said don't do that
So your the culprit that makes the rolls flat
Well i was stunned so i said real fast
No she did it first i did it last
I was just trying to teach her a lesson you see
Squeezing the Charmin's that was the first time for me
Well now i had done it i was caught in the act
And i don't squeeze the Charmin's and that's a fact
She twisted my words upside down
Made me look like a total clown
There i was in the middle of a war
Right in the middle of the grocery store
The moral to the story is don't squeeze the Charmin's
Their is a lot of people looking for those varmints
Categories:
varmints, funny, imagination, peace, time,
Form:
Rhyme
but i wouldn’t fault you words spilling from a loose connection
your heart
a myriad of internal cuts and bruises
exposed wires tattered and frayed
i can hold such damage
with barely a touch
soothe the gnawing of varmints uninvited
be that handy little light
one carries to duel the dark
Thu Mar 5 2020
Categories:
varmints, angst, anxiety,
Form:
Free verse
Frontiersman David (Davy) Crockett,
Often lived on dried fish and jerky kept in his pocket,
Wore caps made from the skin of varmints various,
The odour, ..no doubt, ... was nefarious.
for Clerihew contest sponsored by Catie Lindsey
Categories:
varmints, funny
Form:
Clerihew
(my acknowledgement
to the loose canon of Robert Frost)
An above average snowfall
heavily swathed sage heather
followed by substantial unusual rainfall
punctuated months before, during and
after the growing season
delivered one of the
most hearty crop yields
in living memory
within the generations of men
of this (or any neighboring)
Norwegian bachelor farmer
long time residents
feeling like the sole housekeeper
of Lake Woebegone,
who can remember
the Edenic pasture with reluctance
raw bits and pieces mending wall
experiencing crushing childhood's end
weathered by their parents,
who as kids themselves
(during the worst
fear full Depression
in thee United States of America)
when countless farmers forced
by circumstance declared bankruptcy
locked out of hearth and home
no recourse 'cept to sell rural legacy...
family property deeds
(traced back to original settlers)
contrasts sharply with
plentiful, crucial, and
over abundant annual
precipitation, whereby these vestiges
of rural quaint lifestyle
awash with expansive lush cornfields,
whose silk like tassels
synchronously undulate
(sparsely dotting pastoral landscape),
blistered, calloused, and damned,
whether weathered by blizzards,
or pounded with powerful (one...two)
top notch pugilistic punch
topographical scars permanently earmark,
where Ole man winter relentlessly socked
or Mother Nature slammed a wall of water
saturating freshly mown hay,
which pungent odor
belied teeming flora and fauna
(albeit many organisms nearly invisible)
yet keenly observable to hawk eye,
also tempting black crows
to carrion camping
while a flock of seagulls
swoop down upon unsuspecting
school of fish,
and/or scurrying varmints.
Categories:
varmints, 10th grade, 11th grade,
Form:
Elegy
All an illusion
It's all an illusion.
No matter where I am, I am alway just,
sitting there. Unaware, with a blank stare messy hair
and probably the same clothes that I always wear.
Wrangler jeans, and a button up, sleeved. (period)
Because, I hate T-shirts.
Hate them!
In fact, I'd be fine if they all just disappeared!
Into thin air. I'm serious.
the plague, wasting, predators, or aliens came to take em!
They'd say.
Or they inbred too much,
and their lineage diminished
intelligence forsook em.
Gene pool plummeted
they became disoriented, wrangled and out-competed
and just sort of drifted away,
They'd say,
it was probably believing everything they see on the news.
That led to their doom.
That, and marrying too young, having litters,
of far more than they could possibly support on their wage!
Stupid T-Shirts
And later, when documentaries are made on why their society caved.
they'd say in five languages: “Stupid T-shirts”
You'll see em today, at the Walmart or on display in friendly glass cases,
With nothing but idiotic slogans, and quotes from bad movies
“That's what she said”
Or some sort of shark-cat reaching with fangs and claws up at
a bikini wearin slice of pizza...
They call it “Paws”
Myself, I'd rather be shirtless in a game of seven card stud.
I'd rather be seen strung up dangling by my hair parasailing through Canadian Territory,
and mistaken for a chipmunk. Covered in varmints blood, Or spend my weekend servin sweet tea to
Donald Judd.
Than even be seen wearing one.
No dignity in em,
Just picture Grant, Lee or even Sam Houston
Wearing a shirt with an arrow
That reads:
“I'm with Stupid”
Categories:
varmints, education, funny, humor,
Form:
Cowboy Poetry
There are nights I take a pallet to the porch,
screened-in top to bottom for a peerless,
solitary panorama of emerald grass sloping
to rippling lake, protected from threat
of varmints, a resident reptile or two,
known to favor unattended pets, the smaller
the better. I'm not a mouthful morsel,
I'm here for the choral prayer of froglets, their
deep-voiced granddaddies, petitioning God,
however perceived in the gentle persuasion
of wind, and lilting water music.
I understand, now, in the second half
of life, why, after my father's traitor heart
took him away, my young, widowed
stepmother, (this from memory's vault,)
took her lawn chair down to the sea
to sleep at night for palliative care
seasoned with salt.
Categories:
varmints, daughter, prayer, , Lullaby,
Form:
Free verse
The autumn winds are rattlin' the leaves of corn stalks in the fields.
The corn has been harvested and the farmers are calculatin' their yields.
Golden, yellow and crimson leaves are strewn along the country lane.
Autumn! What a glorious season! 'Tis apple pickin' time again!
Mornin' frosts spread a coat of icin' atop every corpulent punkin'.
Jolly kiddies gather at parties for an old-fashioned apple-dunkin'!
Skeins of geese are wingin' south with their cousins the Whoopin' Crane.
Autumn! What a resplendent season! 'Tis apple pickin' time again!
The branches of apple trees bend low bearing luscious apples galore,
Golden Delicious, Granny Smith, Rome Beauty and so many more,
Waitin' to be plucked from California's shore to the rocky coast of Maine!
Autumn! What magnificent splendor! 'Tis apple pickin' time again!
Ah! To lounge by the fire and enjoy popcorn and cider when the snow flies,
And at Thanksgiving to gather with family to savor Grandma's apple pies!
Jars of apple sauce and apple butter line larder shelves, the winter to sustain!
Autumn! The most delightful season of all! 'Tis apple pickin' time again!
Alas, I won't be pickin' apples from my one and only apple tree this fall!
Sneaky worms, hordes of squirrels and birds have eaten them one and all!
The way those varmints robbed me of my apple crop is a downright crime!
But despite it all, I still cherish autumn 'cause its apple pickin' time!
Robert L. Hinshaw, CMSgt, USAF, Retired
(c) All Rights Reserved
(Not for the contest)
Categories:
varmints, autumn, humorous,
Form:
Rhyme
t started with a single itch
On the end of my nose and made it twitch
Then on one ear and in my hair
I started to itch everywhere
Ooh I scratched and scratched
Until I bled fleas were getting well fed
Ooh those varmints were getting everywhere
i started to do a dance a Rumba
And everyone stopped and stared
The pain was just too much in my pants
My credentials felt like they had been bitten by a thousand ants
I was shimmying body popping getting down
Everyone thought I was the best dancer in town.
Ooh I'm itching now are you too.
Peter Dpme.Copyright.2016.May.
Categories:
varmints, fun, funny, humor, humorous,
Form:
Free verse
While cleaning my house one night,
I heard a noise outside real clear.
I looked out the door and to my surprise
Ol’ Wes, ol’ Craig, and Rocky was there
These little varmints, are varmints indeed,
Three pesky little coons.
They live to investigate what’s on my porch
Those silly, silly goons.
I shooed them away by stomping my foot
But they sat there and looked at me.
Those crazy coons went and made me mad
That was Wes and Craig and Rocky
One of these days, I’ll have revenge
Revenge on these coons, you see.
I’ll get so I can outsmart them
And they won’t outsmart me!
Categories:
varmints, animals, children, funny,
Form:
You can't commit suicide by holding your breath
Going to try it now my good friends
If it works it's been great knowing you guys
If my poe-m e-n-d-s h-e-r-e t-h-e-n-n-n-n-n . . .
Don't panic people, still alive and kicking
Just joshing and having some fun
Macy's founders were passengers on the Titanic
They weren't among the lucky ones
There are 40,000 different species of spiders
Stomp on as many as you can
They're really good-for-nothing no-good-varmints
They deserve to be squished out of hand
Jellybeans contain crushed insect cocoons
That gives them their special shine
I'm never gonna eat another Jellybean again
Don't have a problem with that, I'm fine
Dairy cows apparently produce more milk
When listening to Der Bingle
It also encourages them dance a lot more
With the farm hands, the ones that are single
The insulting slang phrase “kiss my ass”
Dates way back to 1705
Street talk was popular even way back then
It's our duty to keep it alive
© Jack Ellison 2013
Categories:
varmints, humorous,
Form:
Quatrain
It's a wonder young children still turn out all right
With the stuff that gets crammed in their heads every night.
Things like visions of sugar plum fairies and sprites,
Or a thousand tales of Arabian delights,
A frog who turns prince with a kiss from a lass,
A girl who goes dancing in slippers of glass,
A cow that gets high and jumps over the moon,
A crockery dish that elopes with a spoon,
A boy who can fly but refuses to grow,
A difficult girl who plants maids in a row,
A magician who wants to trade old lamps for new,
A woman so poor she must live in a shoe,
A waif who sells matches out in the cold,
A king who can touch things and turn them to gold,
A dog, an old woman, a cupboard that's bare,
A girl locked in a tower, a ladder of hair,
A magical wheel that spins gold out of straw,
A guy helps a lion with a thorn in its paw,
A girl wearing red visits grandma who's resting,
Finds a wolf in her nightdress and Granny digesting,
Three kids and a wardrobe, three men share a tub,
A brave tailor kills seven mean flies with a club,
An archer makes merry with men in the woods
While relieving the rich of their money and goods,
Kind huntsman, fair princess, a vain evil queen,
Seven dwarves, and a prince who gets caught in between,
Hateful fairy, a baby, a hundred-year snit
'cause her name's accidentally left off a guest list,
A piper who lures out of town rodent varmints,
An emperor with new but invisible garments,
A farmer's wife butchers three handicapped mice,
A house drops on top of a witch who's not nice,
While another with gingerbread children seduces
Then gets baked by some twins in her own savory juices,
A giant and a beanstalk, a cat who wears boots,
A wolf who's outfoxed by three pigs in cahoots,
A bad little boy who sticks fingers in pies,
And another of wood whose nose grows when he lies.
There are others, of course, far too many to mention,
But I hope these will serve to excite some attention.
With stories like these knocking 'round in their heads,
It's no wonder if kids toss and turn in their beds.
Yet throughout countless ages these stories survive,
Kids listen, and dream them, and still wake up alive,
No worse for having been charmed or affrighted,
Imaginations are stoked, little minds are ignited,
And continue to hold them in dear veneration
As they pass them along to the next generation.
Categories:
varmints, children, humor, imagination,
Form:
Light Verse
I think it’s time to share for those pet lovers who care ,
about a friend we had when just a lad.
He was just a wee pup and with us grew up,
working around the barn on our farm.
We named him Penny which we thought good as any.
We experienced much joy growing up with "Penny boy".
For his friendship indeed we were much in need,
At seemingly lands end he was our best friend,
other than our buddy Ernie round the bend,
He learned to herd bovines and listened to our whines,
always did as we asked no matter the tasks,
Woodchuck holes dotted the scenery and busted up our machinery,
So ole Pen dog decided they’d be no longer invited.
If a chuck decided to the contrary, Penny turned his home to mortuary.
He’d give him an offer he couldn’t refuse; if he did …he’d lose!
The land was soon cleared of those varmints much feared.
About our friend, that’s just one tiny chapter
Who lives in our hearts and in the hereafter.
He was there for a good game of tug,
or for a hurting child to hug,
His yellow hair a ready sponge for tears,
His panting laugh a joy for many years.
He was a helper, hunter, protector, comrade and friend.
“GO GET ‘EM PENNY” ! ...
We’ll meet you round the bend…
Written for Francine Roberts' "Pick a Pet" contest. 7/04/11
Categories:
varmints, animalsjoy,
Form:
Narrative