SWL began a thread as A Strange Request. We thought you might enjoy reading a small selection of the replies, as it is very topical. It also helped to create this week's Acrostic Challenge!

'A friend is trying to put together as many Valentine's Day poems as possible to put onto one of those huge cards. But there's a twist – they have to include cabbages and it would be good to mention an event that he's arranging on the day. Don't ask, I don't really understand either.

The best he has can come up with is':

My love is like a cabbage,


Divided into two.


The leaves I give to others,


The heart I keep for you.

My love is like a green, green cabbage


That's newly sprung in June.


There's a secret event on Valentine's Day,


You're going to find out soon.

Can you do better? – SWL

I love you like my Brussels sprouts,


You're bitter, yet delicious.


At times you taste like sauerkraut,


But you are not as vicious.


Your love is like a curly kale


And best to be enjoyed with ale.


So here's to you, red cabbage mine:


A great surprise at Valentine


Is waiting just for you.


The cabbage is the clue.

Oh, effervescent cabbage leaf, oh iridescent poppy!


You turn the heads of half the town


But it's turned you proud and stroppy!

More precious than the purest gold, more prized than ale so hoppy,


So long as I put a few slug pellets down,


Thanks to you, nothing ever goes floppy!

Roses are red


Cabbages are green


I love you so much


I will give you my spleen

My love for you is like a cabbage,


It's leafy and plant-y and green.


I don't know if plant-y's a word,


But I'm sure you know what I mean.


This poem stopped being funny,


Somewhere round 'bout line two.


So sorry for this cabbage poem,


I hate this but I love you.

A head of cabbage grows so big


In a bed at the foot of my garden


But I have another bed you know


(My forwardness you'll pardon)


Its head is lonely and its foot


Is waiting for some joy


So let's meet up and bring along


A jolly great Savoy

Shall I compare thee to a cabbage heart?


Thou art more veined, laced with sulphur rare


Rough winds do shake the roof when I fart


And, like them, you hang upon the air...

A plan I have for you


And brassicas too.


What is the grand event?


What could be my intent?


You'll find out on the day.


Till then you'll have to pray


That the cabbage's heart


Is as loved as yours, tart.

My love for you is stronger,


Than a cabbages leaves are green,


quick on up to the bedroom and I'll show you what I mean

Roses are red


Cabbages are green,


be my valentine and I'll give the cabbage a clean

My brassica beauty!


My collard-green cutie!


My sauerkraut sweetie!


My love!

May you grow green forever!


May your beauty wilt never!


May verdant and crisp be


Your heart!

And though I'm below you


I've something to show you


Take pity upon this


Poor worm!

As he bares all his feelings


'mongst the compost and peelings


That nurture the soil at


Your root!

I cannot say more now


(I'd not want to bore, now)


But very soon t'will be


Revealed!

My dwelling in the winter.


My heart of inspiration shorn,


I feel like Harold Pinter.


Entfremdung isn't my forte,


But if you wait, I'll more say


Come Cabbage – er, Valentine's Day.

'My name is Brassica, cabbage of kings:


Look on my leaves, ye Mighty, and despair!'


Nothing beside remains: round the stalk


Of that colossal plant, boundless and bare,


The lone allotment soils stretch far away.

The time has come, my true love said,


To talk of many things.


Of Valentines and Great Events,


Of cabbages and kings.


But what the Great Event might be


He neither says, nor sings.

To you my love I give my heart


Wrapped in cabbage leaves


Hold it closely next to yours


Let it feel you breathe

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day


Or immortalise inside a fresco?


No! To describe my love in cabbage play


I've chosen Romanesco.

Infinitely deep


and bulbous like cactus


I'm scattered and shattered.


In Latin: that's fractus.

And knowing this I do confess.


My heart is in a knot.


misplaced, misshapen and fractured.


Like a mandelbrot.

Verse of lyrics in fluffy florets


in gathering spirals around my head.


Just a cabbage patch kid


with rhyming tourettes.

Can he do it?


Have mercy I implore


What other rhymes


must he have in store?

But fear not; I close upon


this simple adage:


My love is like


a fractal cabbage.

My love for you is as big as a planet,


It's as big as a cabbage from the Isle of Thanet,


Deeply rooted from the very start.


As complex as the leafy whorls about its heart.

Sweet Andrew Marvell once said so.


That vegetable love should grow,


Vaster than empires. Please be mine,


Consent to be my Valentine,


Accept my loving and my praise,


While I'm still in my salad days,


(as Shakespeare wrote). The time is near,


When I'll surprise you, my own dear,


A moment when I'll prove my worth,


An Oxheart cabbage, down–to–earth,


Yet bold enough to claim my wish,


Because, my Darling, you're a dish.

Valentine's Day is here at last


Have all our poems been sent?


Can we ask the outcome of


This mystery event?


What was lurking in the leaves


A maggot or some jewellery?


Tell us or we'll have to drive


You mad with this tom-foolery!

Poetry by Various Contributors

Post Team

19.02.09 Front Page

Back Issue Page