What do you think, as the pen is poised?
Is the thought already fully formed?
Ideas get tested before being employed
Many of which can be ignored
Sometimes the sounds make little sense
The intelligent audience will reject
Every other idea must be dispensed
Until all the logic is found perfect
Let the paper test all your doubt
Brevity of words makes clear the reward
Most everything else can be crossed out
What's left, highlighted and underscored
They say I'm too young.
I'm tired of not being taken seriously.
I'm trying to go incognito.
Wordku: 5-7-5 words
AP: 3rd place 2026
Why do we sometimes stare
into the eyes of oncoming cars?
Is it merely for the thrill of it?
Or are we testing ourselves?
Do we pretend
as they do in stories and on TV
that the good hero darts away
just in time, to save himself
while the evil villain is crushed
beneath the vehicle, blood on his lips?
Do we wait in anticipation
until the last possible moment,
pulling back to understand
which role we play?
Testing Ourselves was originally published in Impspired Magazine, 2026 all rights reserved.
Testing sucks for both you and me
On that I think all can agree
Stuck in with nothing but a pen
Constantly wondering when will this test end
At first you may try to be right but it won't be long
Before your saying eh i could be wrong
I was told Jews were colonists and white
I wondered how to test if that was right
So I looked up genes, a simple approach but bright
Found Jews are at least half Canaanite.
This was found by looking at more than one Neolithic mound.
Bodies, bones, before the Iron age, DNA could be found
I bet my know-it-all debater hadn't thought of looking at that
He looks at debate as throwing me on the mat.
Who belongs in Israel is an ongoing fight
Interestingly, the Arabic speakers are also part Canaanite
But the relationship with Jews is uneasy at best.
Still, there was a way to test.
Europe's prehistory can be tested too
Most residents died, we look for a clue
5000 years ago, some evidence it was disease
Eurasian steppe peoples took over the keys
If you admire Stonehenge, please know
The people who built it had nowhere to go
Most of their descendants were gone by 2000 B.C
No one at fault, seek the truth and be free.
Life is a series of tests
armies of unwelcome guests
wave after wave of insect pests ~
From them a crown you must wrest
Baby Duck Testing Boundaries – Not A Swan
If I Could Choose My
Superpower, “Oh
Genie Of The 1001
Lamps… All Lamp Lights…”
It Would Be
Non-Conformity…
Perspectives Are
Hidden Everywhere,
Many Still Absolutely
Unique.
And Because It’s
An Actual Power,
Nobody Can Say:
“He's One Of Those,
Or He's One Of These..
We Know That Kind,
Make Sure It's Fixed…”
Because It Is SUPER!
No Need To Fix.
If This Sounds Familiar
To You, Well Then:
“Oops.”
Guess I’ll
Keep At It Then,
Quack.
-Gray Squirrel
07-15-2025
1946 United States authorities
chose to exercise freedom of choice
and forcibly relocated 167 Marshall islanders
King Juda he agreed as their voice
from Bikini Atoll east to Rongerik
a small island which adequate resources lacked
with the promise they would return
so much for the U.S. Right of Freedom Act
and with little regard to radiation or fallout
the beautiful coral lagoon's sad fate
was a nuclear weapon testing site
twenty-three tests in all 'til 1958
but scientists miscalculated
a dry-fuel thermonuclear bomb they blew
The limericks that herein you meet
Were tested for pressure and heat.
Confirmed for all nozzles,
And yet, if one wozzles,
Return, if you kept the receipt.
I should have listened to my nieces,
they said it would fall into pieces,
when the temperature decreases.
Then all those dirty rats and meeses,
will crawl in through the cracks and creases,
and its effectiveness then ceases.
Forget cognitive testing
How about a basic economics test
to separate responsible Congressional
and Presidential candidates from the rest
Testing the water --- such is wisdom feat
as lad prepares toward Olympic fleet
yet knows that he's not a fool
to bathe in cool swimming pool
since hygienic concerns he first must beat.
I took a personality test, it caught fire on question 17.
Sphinx applied for a job at Duel Tool Instrument Manufacturing.
During his first days he was assigned four breaks and lunch at
Noon which lasted for 45 minutes.His work days would be four
days a week with $21.00 an hour. The company is opened seven
days a week Eight hour shifts could be divided by seven or four
Days straight with the company having the option of calling him
In for overtime which could be no more than five hour shifts with
A company dinner plan on weekends.The dinner plan would reduce
His pay by 12%.
Seven weeks into his beginning the company asked him to take his
Lunch at 11:00.They used a camera to monitor the lunch room.
At the end of the first week the manager returned him to the noon
Lunch schedule He noticed his portion size was reduced and the company
asked him to take less time for lunch and gave him a fifteen minutes break
To compensate the time. This is called a what?
A. Pain in the a$s shedule
B. A monitored mangament shedule
C. A Notified shedule
D. A camera monitored shedule.
That Bouis can sing ya'll type of deal
Sphinx applied for a job at Duel Tool Instrument Manufacturing.
During his first days he was assigned four breaks and lunch at
Noon which lasted for 45 minutes.His work days would be four
days a week with $21.00 an hour. The company is opened seven
days a week Eight hour shifts could be divided by seven or four
Days straight with the company having the option of calling him
In for overtime which could be no more than five hour shifts with
A company dinner plan on weekends.The dinner plan would reduce
His pay by 12%.
Seven weeks into his beginning the company asked him to take his
Lunch at 11:00.They used a camera to monitor the lunch room.
At the end of the first week the manager returned him to the noon
Lunch schedule He noticed his portion size was reduced and the company
asked him to take less time for lunch and gave him a fifteen minutes break
To compensate the time. This is called a what?
A. Pain in the a$s shedule
B. A monitored mangament shedule
C. A Notified shedule
D. A camera monitored shedule.
That Bouis can sing ya'll type of deal
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