Last updated: January 7, 2006

Light Verse: Forms I've Invented:

VillainHells, villanelles on what to do with villains in Hell (Demonic Viewpoint):

STALIN

What shall we do with Stalin?
He wasn't very nice.
The Man of Steel has fallen.

His coldness was appallin' --
He'd keep quite well in ice...
What SHALL we do with Stalin?

Can't find a hole to crawl in?
No tiniest interstice?
The Man of Steel has fallen.

His wily smile twists foul in
Our latest weird device --
We made it just for Stalin,

Hard work, our demons all in!
Yet still they slice and dice
This man of steel who's fallen,

Poor shrunk black thing, a yowlin',
Quite lost among his lice --
What shall we do with Stalin,
The Man of Steel who's fallen?

HITLER

What shall we do with Hitler --
Who dwarfed his era's stage --
Now that he's so much littler?

A question for the Riddler:
He's so consumed with rage,
What's left to burn of Hitler?

That gadget's called a "whittler" --
How fine we've set its gauge
Now that he's so much littler.

We'll feed him -- "Where's that vittler!
Hey! Shit for the coprophage!
Let's bulk up little Hitler!

Eat more! Don't be a piddler!"
Can't keep him in his cage
Now that he's so much littler.

Shall we make him hear Bette Middler
Until the next ice age?...
What shall we do with Hitler
Now that he's so much littler?

MAO

What shall we make of Mao?
Let's turn Tse Tung to dung,
Torn by each peasant's plow,

Within an endless now --
No Great Leap Forward! Hung
In time (all done) is Mao,

Succumbing to the Tao,
To a Thousand Flowers flung,
Torn by each peasant's plow,

Soon rice in hot Kung Pao,
He'll burn on every tongue --
That's what we'll make of Mao:

Gut fodder! Then, Ciao, Chow!
[He'll get no help from Chou.]
Please wipe him from your bung.
Here's more dung for the plow!

Where's that serene fat brow?
That little wet red tongue?
There's not much left of Mao
[His disciples heed the Dow],
Torn by each peasant's plow.

SADDAM

What shall we do with Saddam?
Pile palace upon palace
With Saddam on the bottom:

He wanted 'em -- he's got 'em!...
Too light -- his heart's a callus;
We must pile MORE on Saddam.

He's tough as Hillary Rodham!
(SHE'D bust his balls -- AND phallus --
With Saddam on the bottom.)

This is hard work! Oh SOD him!
He's diamond hard, pure malice.
What can we do with Saddam

To make him bellow, "Goddamn!",
Beg "Take from me this chalice!"?
(To our ears, sweet as Callas.)
Let's paddle his bare bottom

To hurt his pride...then prod him
To watch in dumb paralys-
-is endless runs of "Dallas" --
If THAT'S too nice for Saddam,
We'll dig a deeper bottom.

The PANTALOON: You can figure the form out from the example. This form would be ideal for operetta, with two singers alternating lines from the legs, with their criss-crossed rhymes. Here's the world's first pantaloon (perhaps a slightly bell-bottomed one, unless those are the shoes (pigeon-toed) at the bottom):

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Note: You have to read each leg separately for the sense, then read them interwoven (reading straight across) for the music. The rhymes are criss-crossed. The first 8 lines of the legs are simple criss-crossed rhymes (garters?). The next 6 lines are two 3-way scrambles of rhyme. And the rhymes finally meet with the last line. As creator of the form, I decree that the rhyme schemes of the legs may vary from pantaloon to pantaloon, but must be strict and sufficiently loony. And the two legs must be alternative conclusions to the first 8 lines. It's a good form for love poems: if you write a pantaloon, you'll never pant alone! The poem could also be called an arch. Besides being shaped like one, it is very arch, if not archaic -- perhaps the archness of triumph.

Besides all poems should be in pants
Of passion: hard-fast-breathing rants.
Ignore old-fashioned critics' cuffs, [on the ear]
But don't forget back-cover puffs.

The following poems I call "haikuku". They are haiku-length poems that contain, in some obnoxious way, the word "haiku."

"Open the pod door,
Hal." "I'm sorry, Dave, I can't
do that." Haikubrick.

Pointed sheets as white
as Fuji's snow conceal fools:
The Haiku Klux Klan.

At the mall, slender,
giggling, bare-belly-buttoned,
bright-eyed haikuties.

Haik! Haik! Haik! Haik! Haik!
Excuse me...HAIK!...Sorry, I've...HAIK!
got the...HAIK!...haikups!

"Tick...tick...tick...tick...tick..
tick...tic,...tick...HAIKUCKOO!" says
the haikuckoo clock.

"Now leaving on track
eleven for Pomona...and Hai-
kucamonga..." [Only for old Jack Benny fans]

Off to fight Iraq:
Bye-bye trees, hello, sand; bye,
U.S., HaiKuwait.

Gulf War -- no time for
our half-done sonnets;
even haikuwait.

"What's a girl like you
doing in a poem like this?"
"Oh, take a haiku!"

If she were Mae East,
She'd greet us, "Haikumon up
and see me some time."

Cherry-blossom time,
poet -- and just LOOK at that
full moon -- your haikue! [high cue]

Carefully he counts
each syllable, removes an
adverb -- old haikoot!

To Basho, whose frog
still plops into the old pond,
hearty haikudos.

Height-Ashbury and
Telegraph Avenue swarm
with haikool haikooks.

Marijuana is
elementary cool. Like,
beware of haikool.

Tallest trees smothered
by bright green rounded jungles
of vines: Haikudzu.

Beware of High Priests:
Doubt their high dogma and don't
drink their haikulaid.

"On your way," said Stalin.
"Say 'Hai, Gulags,' you stubborn,
stubborn haikulaks!

Mexican dancers
stomp, leap and STOMP STOMP STOMP! Hai-
kucuraCHA!

The next 6 poems exemplify a form I call the Iambit: iambic monometer sonnets. Monometer means each line is one foot in your mouth. I also call them "snots" -- very short sonnets. Alas, they aren't very funny, but they're kind of fun:

How warm,
O sun,
thy hon-
eyed swarm

of rays
like bees
that seize
our days

and take
our lives --
their hives --
to make

this bone-
deep drone.

Brigh crys-
Tal stuff,
Enough!
I miss

Dull tar-
ry street,
Concrete,
My car,

Grass, dirt,
Leaf, bud,
Worms, mud,
Short-skirt-

Ed girls,
Quick squirrels.

No thieves
grab hold
of gold-
en leaves.

They lie
in heaps
no mi-
ser keeps --

yet, see
wee rouge-
cheeked Scroog-
es WHEEE! --

all rolled
in gold.

Bright frost-
y moon,
cartoon
my lost

breath in-
to cloud-
lets loud
with din

of words
and sighs
that rise
where birds

construe,
pooh-pooh...

O but-
terfly,
you die!
Now what

new mon-
archs will
o'er-spill
like bon-

fire flame
our trees?
You came
to freeze..

unreason-
ing season!

A war-
y web
Is Feb-
ruar-

y. Bare
Trees, peb-
bles, ebb
of car-

ing -- snare
For sap-
less husks --
Dusk hair,
Warm lap,
Soft musks...

My stom-
-Ach.chirp-
-ing...BURP!
Poor Tum!

No gum
Nor syrup
Nor Pur-
-Ple chum

Nor skill
my rag-
-Ing gut
Can still –
The wage
Of Glut.