Meet the mad, manic, Mister Murgatroyd
An undynamic blistered humanoid
A curred curmudgeon you don't want to meet
In a bar, back alley, or dead end street
He's a filthy, flagrant, flatulent fart
Sewer rat mind and tarantula heart
Cleaves cuddly kittens, feeds them to guppies
Pet pranks the pet shop, punting the puppies
He's our white whale and our snake in the grass
A demon from hell, one pain in the ass
His black, rotten heart's beyond all belief
We need good karma to offer relief
Slurp burping some soup, soup wouldn't swallow
Burp slurping for breath, death would soon follow
A lone chicken bone was lodged in his throat
His face had changed tone and started to bloat
No one there for the Heimlich maneuver
Cuz no one cared from here to Vancouver
No smelling salts would be administered
No certificate of death was registered
They scrambled his brains to stop his last twitch
Then scraped his remains, dropped him in a ditch
A soulless soul and one sorry old sot
Heavens to Murgatroyd?... Heaven thinks not!
A gentleman opened his mail,
When out jumped a sprightly young snail.
"I'm glad to be out,"
He said with a shout,
"I thought I was in a white whale."
The
white whale~
Whiteness appearing
in this story
as a whale~and as
other appearances
in stories including
yours and mine~
Whiteness
a name for the
unnameable~~
To unknown shores, I have now come,
to seek my fate, if I have one.
Not found at home, where was before,
I have now come to unknown shores.
Through salty sea, through storm and wind;
I've been to hell and back again.
I'll find my fate, where'er she be,
through storm and wind, through salty sea.
Oh! There she blows! My ship's white whale!
Raise the anchor and set the sails;
And if that fails then I will row…
My ship's white whale, Oh! There she blows!
Finally home; heroic tale:
Not seeking still through stormy gale.
'Round the fire and not alone…
Heroic tale; finally home.
When I am up, every sky is a boundless, cloudless expanse of brilliantly blinding blue.
When I am up, I am William the Conqueror and William Shakespeare and William Jennings Bryan all in one.
When I am up, life is an eternity of perfect days punctuated by soul-shaking truths at every turn.
When I am up, every person I meet is a fount of infinite expectations.
When I am up, my momentous happiness is so moment-to-moment that if I look away for but an instant I might miss it all.
When I am up, I cannot turn away. I am a moth to the flame. I am Icarus. I am entranced by my own fire’s burning ballet. I am ablaze.
When I am up, I feel the gravity of every instant, weighing me down with the weight of it all as I struggle not to fall back to reality.
When I am up, I am alone. I am adrift on my sea of ideas?—?in search of my white whale, trying to stay within the white lines, staring into the glaring white light?—?without hope of rescue.
When I am up, I must come down…
-- by ThoughtsFromB4
"just something I wrote to better explain my bipolar poles"
Have you ever drank Vulcan ale
You’ll get the runs and turn quite pale
You’ll need a bucket for your stool
And you’ll be screaming like a fool
It’s also known as a white whale
Writing a torrent
hoping for one
Words are endemic
tide zero-sum
(Dreamsleep: July, 2023)
The White Whale
Atlantis
or Holy Grail
Avarice and greed
destruction
prevails
(Dreamsleep: June, 2023)
Poetry will not keep you warm
Not like a cat nestled between legs
But, it hunts down manic thoughts
Gnashes the static till the mind gives
Chases a thought till claws are bloody
Keeps you drenched in sweat
Yes, she mews for attention
Till its cries grate every nerve
Till I feed it words & want
Poetry keeps me squirming
Caught in a net skimming a deluge
Waiting for words to be hauled
The big catch ever escaping
Keeps me checking the line
Insisting I jump into cold waters
Foolishly like Ahab chasing a tail
Sadness is my white whale
Mad with promises holey
Poetry is a leaky bucket
Catching the rain of words
Within depression's storm
Coming like a cat with a pail
Impossible and torrential
Ensnaring me for an hour
Keeps me back for seconds
Promising an easy catch
Cold and slippery
In oceans deep, the white whale sings
He seeks a mate to ease his pain
His song, it plays on our heart strings
As Moby Dick searches in vain
Such loneliness no whale can feign
For he’s the last of “great white” kings
Angry, no love can he attain
Casting hapless ships ‘neath waves’ rings
January 21, 2020
For Charlie Messina’s “Oh-No A Twisted Char-Lay Poetry Contest”
Uphill and down dale
We walk, we talk, we both frown...
But why do you look so pale
And as grey as a white whale
One that is all lost at sea
Or is it just me that I see
As rare as rare can ever be
Swimming all alone
Never picking up the phone
I think it's sometimes you and mostly me
Why we are are both caught in the deep
So how profound as great white whales
We can both share the crown
Without ever uttering a sound
DAMO
Off, with all the luxury and arrogance that is man,
To a place where the sun dies beyond land’s end,
Through the foam and spray that christened you,
Yet, failed to cleanse your original sin.
And with bones of chalk and a fire within,
You held your head high for a last look at the sky,
While captains of industry and huddled masses,
Were cradled in Poseidon’s unforgiving, arms.
And a white whale, that you never pursued,
Though you were obsessed with wealth and status,
Cut deep into your ferric flesh,
To seal your fate, no doubt predestined.
And at a great depth you will lie for eternity,
Your human souls a tragedy of the highest order,
But your soul’s lust for greed and power,
Will be your everlasting legacy.
Folding in to convention,
Sealed in creases of acceptance,
Maligned and misled
By the false promises
Of a stolen heart,
We chase the white whale
Of validation
Into waters of denial…
‘Fury—the rallying cry
of our vengeful spirit
Hate—the jilted lover
of our fated selves’
(Villanova Pennsylvania: February, 2016)
I would tell you a sea-farer's sad tale
About a captain who chased a white whale
To the depths he condemned
All but one of his men
And alas for my name isn't Ishmael
8.2.18
Sponsor: Carolyn Devonshire
Contest: Sea Tales Limericks
Gift for Lady (purple)
Folding in to convention
Sealed in creases of acceptance
Maligned and misled
By the false promises
Of a stolen heart
We chase the white whale
Of validation
Into waters of denial…
“Fury—the rallying cry
of our vengeful spirit
Hate—the jilted lover
of our fated selves”
(Villanova Pennsylvania: February, 2016)
Sub Categories
Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.