We call it adult humor
Dressed like late night intellect
But the joke is just a cheap dare
We clap like it’s profound
We claim it’s edgy commentary
Wrapped in clever phrasing
But it’s really playground bravado
Posing as sophistication
We say it’s mature wit
Served with craft beer confidence
But it’s just petty mischief
Wearing a grown up voice
We insist it’s highbrow comedy
Sold as cultural insight
But it’s thin skinned teasing
Masquerading as satire
We pretend we’ve evolved past childishness
Framing jokes as worldly wisdom
But the truth is embarrassingly simple
We never stopped laughing at the easy stuff
My son eats
ice cream
in front of a heater
in January.
He asked me
if that made sense,
so, I told him:
“It does for you,
Ben.”
,
As a mother
to a middle-schooler
I have become
the one-and-only
unappreciated
chauffeur,
the thesaurus
that he doesn’t
trust,
the center
of all things
wrong
and embarrassing.
Meanwhile,
I continue
to be proud
of the man
he is becoming
and my little hand
that nudges him
along,
however
embarrassingly,
and sometimes
I catch him
smiling back.
‘Twas high on Binnicky Barney
that I asked you to be mine.
The ear was on the barley
and the grape weighed down the vine.
The clouds were high,
and so was I,
on whimsy, wit and wine.
A name is just a nonsense-game,
and love an empty snare:
and shame and blame are all the same,
but you and I were there.
In summer’s throes,
the fungus knows
its spores are in the air.
“Bryn y Cabanau”, so it’s called,
as per the ancient tongue,
and I was galled, abashed, appalled,
embarrassingly wrong.
For lovers’ lisps
are will o’the wisps,
and never last for long.
There’s merit in mistake, they say,
and losing leads to learning,
and every dog must have its day,
and every worm’s for turning.
(For all we glean,
we wish we’d been
a little more discerning.)
Solution is a kind of death,
regret a form of doubt:
and love’s a type of crystal meth
from which delusions sprout.
The pieces fit,
but you’re the bit
I haven’t yet worked out.
Maybe you’ll call
Today
Maybe you won’t
Deep down
I don’t like the sound
Of either
If you do
I’m a cracked
Overused step stool
For your ego
Overflowing our conversations
With daydreams filling
Our summer
Just for you
To leave each one
At your doorstep
As you shut off
Your bedroom light
Without saying a word
But still expect me
To be waiting there
In the morning
With no tears
No questions
Just happy to see you
With that pleasant smile
On my face
You compliment but really overlook
Just so my change
Ends up in your
Pockets
Cause you spend yours
On things that are
killing your lungs slowly
Or just leave
Your eyes
constantly bloodshot
But if you don’t call
Embarrassingly I feel worse
Than how you treat me
If I let my heart be broken by a stranger
Is it impossible to believe
Or if loving at the first of sights
Not embarrassingly naive
Or if I claimed to know of true intentions
From a flurried passing gaze
Or if from but a fleeted greeting
Be colorfully amazed
Or if to me it makes no difference
Instants or many years
Or if without specifics
Commute your pain into my tears
Or if clairvoyantly I see the way
Of two becoming one
Or if to me it's always been shone
Like the everlasting sun
Or if you could only know me wholly
Now the way I see your soul
Or if it would only take forever
Fervorous ardor full
All this introspection
gets too much,
crushing you under
its own gravity, drawing you
inwards. Even the senses are
captive to its cause, the head
a dark, claustrophobic hole.
Then the world miraculously
intervenes with an afternoon,
blowing leaves in circles
about your heavy feet
as if to tickle and bend solemn
lips into a begrudging smile.
Then the unexplainable,
a sense of something escaping,
glancing off the ordinary
into eternity
and almost embarrassingly,
you give a little skip.
Nigeria is on the precipice
A country in dire need of redemption
Blessed extravagantly by providence
But ravaged ignorantly by
Leadership failure
Built on faulty foundation of
Impunity, corruption and nepotism
Which has engendered overtime
Inequality of crass proportion
As insignificant few
Swim in obscene opulence
While embarrassingly majority
Wallow in criminal poverty
Arise you men of good will
Silence is no longer golden
Arise wrestle our country back
From the spirit of live and let die
Arise my compatriots to the clarion call
To rescue God’s masterpiece
From total annihilation
Stand up and be counted
Together let us overcome
Waiting on a rainbow to show up
is like waiting for man
the long hours or even the years that requires
for one of Nature's wonders
Some have divine the scientific approach to
rainbows but I am in love with the seven rays of light
and the arc.
But unlike men
Rainbows do not disappoint or leave one hanging like a one night-stand
or make promises with the taste of cheap alcohol on its breathe
or climbing up the stairs at 2 am in the morning and embarrassingly waking up
the children and then leaves the next morning with the memory that his visit was just a dream.
No rainbows are forever
a covenant that God will never forsaken us
Rainbows are a promise
of a new world and a new start and something that is wondrous
Rainbows are rainbows and every one is like ones first love
that tendering meetings of the lips of Heaven and Earth.
Santa Claus climbed a chimney
Suddenly he fell off a high wall,
His big bum was embarrassingly sore
because he had a horrendous fall.
03/01/22
'A Funny Christmas Themed 4 liner' Contest
Sponsor Tania Kitchin
The biggest mockery of what couples have one other told,
Impressing a play acting, very bold
To conceal some sure, future bickering
From a supportive solemn gathering.
Spouses once dying to see each other’s nudity
Now abhor each other’s faces,
The other one an outright oddity
That looks a bit tolerable behind laces…
A time Satan proves himself more profound
Than his shallow critics could ever imagine,
Himself taking as duty-bound
To install between partners the widest margin.
It’s an interrupted journey on the marital highway,
A keeping of a connubial affair at bay:
A once blossoming cooperation
Giving way to life-long separation.
Divorce, the fullest licence gives to either party
To openly crush one’s lips against a new Sweetie’s,
Even with one’s Ex embarrassingly nearby;
An asking of “Hot Tears” to stand by.
Nothing cooled the jets of Charlene Banties
Not drink or water hose from her aunties.
Sticky by summer’s night
Sweat master by daylight
Summer sun kept her wet to her panties.
Words seem too inadequate
And blank remains my mind
As I try and pen down these lines
That in my mind, ceaselessly levitate
Why does my world seem so colourful?
My future so uncertain, yet bright?
What is this song in my heart, so soulful?
And this joy that I feel at its height?
'I think its you', I embarrassingly wonder
Its probably just another childish blunder
Or a make-believe, undeserving grandeur
But i can feel my scared self surrender.
'cause you free me of all my sorrows
Make me hopeful of my tomorrows
Bring out the timid self within me
To a better version of myself, be.
You make me want to protect you,
Save you from society and foe
To just wrap you up from head to toe
And ask God to please let me keep you.
So, thank you for my daily dose of relish
Thank you for all these moments to cherish
Thank you for accepting me with all my blemish
I hope we can journey together till the finish.
They lost a priceless baby at birth,
o my, how much we all did mourn-
still accepting God’s planned worth,
beloved lil’ Johnny was finally born;
(no more pain - no longer torn) forgot the times they were forlorn.
Now he is four and a delight,
a true miracle for sure is he-
when him and his baby sister fight
he always says sorry immediately;
a kind soul to the topmost degree – that treasured boy Johnny.
Starting preschool was fun,
he learned the ABC’s super quick-
at times when chores are to be done,
he’s naughty, pretending to be sick;
a silly child with the same ol’ trick (so mischievously slick!)
Respectful and raised in virtue.
Always listening to what matters-
tarries around singing “Only You”;
for his daddy loves “The Platters”.
With a little girl at school he flatters, then he embarrassingly scatters.
Soon he shall turn the age of five,
such a very long life to live yet-
our family is grateful he was born alive,
that lovely morn in May we shan’t forget.
They have not one single regret - we shall always be in God’s debt.
Date - October 31, 2019
He was a crowd puller
Not a crowd pleaser
But was it enough?
Apparently so.
He went to the top
Smoothly, quickly, and embarrassingly
Everything was great now.
Great, great, great, great, great. His best word. Great.
But it was not enough.
He wanted to be King or Czar.
He wanted a crown. He asked for a great crowner.
Get him one from England, someone yelled.
In British dialect, crowner is a coroner
in case you did not know.
I thought this was great.
Great great great great great.
she had wings
but didn't
know how to
use them
often they
would get
in her way
a conversation
piece always
embarrassingly
asked by dates
she usually had
a hard time
getting
through
doors
forgetting
she needed
to walk side
ways in order
for her
to fit in
sometimes
it's hard to
be an
angel
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