First there was a Man. Then a Woman. Then in quick succession, two cats, a confused dog beast, and two kids. I stay at home with them. I'm the Man

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Knucklehead Blog-Off Rd 4: Seussified

This is the semifinals of the big knucklhead blog-off. This week's challenge: Write something in the style of Dr. Seuss. As I said last year, I am deeply apologetic to the good Dr. for the following piece. 
Please, read everyone's entry, and then vote here. Voting starts today and continue's through wednesday evening. I promise, if I win, I will share my trophy with all of you. We can take turns like they do with the Stanley Cup.  Ok, here we go.

Drawn from the Cat in the Hat, among others.


Our mother was leaving. She had work, then a date.
"You'll see," she chirped brightly, "you'll get along great."

We'd met him before, this new beau of our mother's
I'd give him a 4 when compared to the others
There was Clarence with candy, the dentist name Joel
Fat sweaty Ned and Alex the Mole

Bruno the butcher,  Cedric the Chemist
Mom loved'em and left'em, her record unblemished
Her latest distraction, this newest toy boy
was the rigid and beady-eyed Officer Roy

He'd worked very hard to get date number second
With flowers and candy, he'd pleaded and beckoned
So off Mommy went, racked with hungorous pangs
"Five thirty," she'd told him, "At P.F. Changs."

She kissed us goodbye, her pace started to quicken
as she left she was mumbling "ooh, Kung Pao chicken"
We didn't mind, we were used to the drill
We rarely got bored but still,

Still
     Still
         Still

This particular day was much harder to fill

So we invented a game called "what did you find?"
Closets, cabinets and toy chests were mined
We went in to Mom's room and went through her drawers
Found things we won't speak of; unspeakable horrors

As we retreated, wretching and spastic
Sally's hand slid across a bag made of plastic
She grabbed it on instinct, we ran from our doom
When we looked in the bag, it was full of mushrooms

These mushrooms were strange, twisted, and dried
dusty ol' fungi that looked mummified.
But mushrooms they were, we felt certain and sure
we'd seen porcinis like that at Trader Joe's #4
(It was mom's favorite shoppingest grocery store)

Sally said, "Let's make pizza or stuff them with cheese,
brew them in water to make a fine tea?"
"Jesus." I grumbled and snatched them right quick
pulled one out of the bag and gave it a lick.

"Musty" I thought then said, "what the heck?"
through the teeth, down the hatch inside of my neck.
I ate one, then another, then two dozen more.
Then my brain introduced us, my face and the floor.

I doubled over and slouched to my knees
put my face on the floor, it was cool as the breeze.
I manage to glance a glance that was glancing;
Sally was doing some floor-facing prancing.

We were writhing and moaning, the shrooms made us sick.
The sunlight flashed wierdly, my saliva was thick.
Then the sickness was gone, quick as it came
And I knew that I'd never see things the same.

Sally, I smiled, do you see what I hear?
Songs of red over here, vivid music from there.
No, she grinned back, I'm busy with meeting
this loquacious young ficus whose sir name is Keating.

Our goldfish was exquisite, the colors entrancing
fiery golds, rippling silvers, his scales were dancing.
He peered into the black of my frisbee sized peepers
"Stop staring" he blooped, "you give me the creepers."

The room came alive, shadows shifted, congealed.
"This couch feels so good," my prone sister squealed.
"Look at me," she continued, "look at me now.
The couch is a ship and I'm up on the bow."

"From this bow I can see the garden outside.
Oh, the flowers are singing!" my drugged sister cried
(I can confirm with sanguinity that she hadn't lied)

The roses were crooning a good tune for hoofin'
As a mum honked along on a saxamagroofin'
The lily smashed cymbals as big as my noggin
The carnation strummed notes from a banjamagoggin

The sunflower, towering high into the air
blew on a BassooneTrumpaphoneClaronare.
The notes that they played on their odd instruments
were perfumed with the odor of each of their scents

There was no way around it, we were higher than birds
We spent fifteen minutes eating our words
Sally then thunk a thought, one that I thought was great
"I'll be Mom and pretend that I'm out on her date."

I ran to the kitchen and grabbed our old mop,
"This mop can stand in for her friend, Roy the Cop."
That's when the fun suddenly screeched to a stop.

We knew we were screwed, dead, fucked and in trouble.
"Clean up this mess," we both screamed, "On the double."
It was no use of course, our trips were still tripping
You can't clean when the fabric of time is a'ripping

My sister ran by at a panicky scamper
as I carefully placed the lamp in the hamper
We grabbed armfulls of everything, pots, games, and clothes
Most of this stuff we stuffed into the stove

We were attempting to kennel the cat with the fish
when we heard from the driveway a wet tire-y swish
they were home, we were done, it was up with the jig
We'd have to face up to Mom and her Pig.

Mom came in first, Roy was carring the park
She turned on the light (we could see in the dark).
She looked at the house, and then looked in our eyes
She made not a sound, her mouth gaped with surprise.

She recovered quite quickly, and said with a bite
"To your rooms, in your beds, you're done for the night.
Don't whimp a whimper, I'll deal with Roy
And when he has left, We'll talk, girl and boy.

We heard her say "sorry" and "my head is quite sore."
You could tell Roy had visions of an evening of more
But he finally left, we heard his car start and depart
And Mom yelled, "I'm coming to get you, that's your head start!"

She ranted and raved, talked of grounding and smacking
She'd get a lock for her door, and a lead pipe for whacking
She said and she said and she spoke and she clamored
Our asses were "anvils " her hands were "the hammers."

"Get out of my sight," she yelled with great force
and we scrambled to do so, gladly of course.
We decided as one, to never again
speak of the time we ate psilocybin.

22 comments:

  1. Oh, man, this is simply brilliant. The part about the musical instruments killed me. I know a guy who plays the banjamagoggin.

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  2. Oh, yeah... I remember psilocybin well.

    This is hysterical and pure genius. Loved it. Now off to read the others.

    BTW, you may want to take a look Disqus for your commenting. It's more interactive and my comments have really increased since I went to it. Easy to load on Blogger.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Awesome. I'm facebooking you.

    My two favorite of many great lines: "Then my brain introduced us, my face and the floor." and "He peered into the black of my frisbee sized peepers / Stop staring" he blooped, "you give me the creepers."

    Bravo!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Love it! I wonder how often Seuss got into the 'shrooms in the closet?

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  5. My favorite line has to be:

    Our asses were "anvils " her hands were "the hammers."

    ReplyDelete
  6. No contest at all! This is great.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wow. You took the cake with this one!

    Bravo!

    Excellent!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Nice job, honey. I'm with Knucklehead about the musical instrument stanza -- just beautiful!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Wow! That is awesome. Glad I'm already out; saved me embarrassment!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I will say it again because I read your last poem and I know...
    You gotta be channelling the fine Dr. -- but whoa.
    The whole mushroom bit was a bit more than clever.
    I wouldn't, I couldn't...not in my life...never.
    Compete on your level and to this I say "Sigh...
    ...not even with a psilocybin high."


    Wickedly clever...seriously, you gotta be his offspring somehow or other.

    I know what...go ask your mother. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  11. Fucking brilliant, is all I can say.
    Frankly, my dear, you've won the day!

    ;-)

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  12. Wow! This is a read to trip. . . I mean a trip to read.

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  13. Brilliance.

    I'd read you in a house. I'd read you with a mouse. I would read you on a train, I would read you in the rain.

    And now I'll go vote.

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  14. ::slow clap building into crescendo::

    This is inspired greatness!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Excellent. Found you through Pearlie Girl. Will haunt you again.

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  16. Love it, think ill print it out and read it for the little guy's bedtime tonight :D

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  17. Hi everyone. Thank you so much for all the very, very kind comments. You guys are awesome. And hi to the new readers/commenters. I'm glad you stopped by.

    ReplyDelete

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