h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It might be fun if we had a Bad Poetry thread. Come on out all you would-be Vogon poets!

Guidelines

Must be poetry, or recognisably an attempt at poetry.

Please give author's name, (even if it's one of your own pen-names)- or you can just say orig. if it is and you prefer to.

There are loads of terrible poems about on the net. If that's where the particular poem comes from, please give author and URL (optional)so we can enjoy any other work they've done. In books too, of course.

Make quotations shorter than original work, to keep the Monitors away.

There are also plenty on h2g2, but please do not quote those, out of friendship.

If more guidelines are needed, or you don't agree with these, please say so.

Now - scribble or c&p away!

Jab

TIME AND LOVE

By E.J. Wordsworth Jabberwock


Gone! Vanished are the days that were to come!
(Or some),
They seemed to pass relentlessly!
And yet the days that are still to come,
Will pass by even more swiftly!

Time is the Lord that rules us all,
(Holds us in thrall),
It's so very true!
Ask Dr. Who!
From festivals to days at work and at play!
It giveth birth and death,
To whom it may!

Its only Master Love, Love that fires the maiden’s heart!
(And maketh some chaps uncomfortable),
Yea, naught but Love giveth us a start,
Called birth, that maketh us invincible!
That giveth both pleasure and pain immeasurable!
And ecstasies unimagineable!
And all the flowers so beautiful!

Today I woke up in a wombat's pouch.
Dizzy. Reeling. Queasy feeling.

Then she hollered down the well,
"Rodney, you'll go straight to H____"

There once were three little squirrels
Who had some adorable curls,
Named Curly Sue, Billy Buttons, and Spasmoragossety.

The wombat was not amused,
But ignored me,
And this did not bother me,
Because the world will be ending in 24 days, 6 hours, and Cottontail.

By Paul H., the flarf king

MY FOX AND I

by Doris Evadne Prune

My old red fox
Got out of his box
And went flying round the room.
He was a temporary flying fox
As I'd hit him with my broom.

Oh, sad to say
I've lost my way
With my pet fox

Back in his box
We don't know where to go.

It's far too hot in Mexico
And Russia's full of snow.

France and Spain won't take him
Since he had that brush with the law -
It makes you wonder sometimes
What pets are for.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-IU-NQ8c14

By 'Nice doggerel-dear' - PBS

I wandered lonely as a cloud,
And muttered to myself aloud,
The men in white coats took me in,
And now I'm in the loony-bin.

HAIKU

The cherry blossom
In my neighbour's garden - Oh!
It looks really nice



Wendy Cope, from 'Strugnell's Haiku'.


In her latest book 'Two Cures For Love'.
Deliberately bad, of course.

roses are red
violets are blue
Saturday comes before Sunday
and that's a fact too

err! mine

This thread asks for very bad rhyme
To write one I just can't find the time.

Sorry I forgot to state the author
To say so I just oughter.

Me.

Author: Douglas Munday

Title: Greek without tears. (written for Donna).[extract]

Well there I was in Corfu
to see the sights I'd dreamt;
the Acropolis; Colossus,
I wondered where they'd went?
'Twas barren, grey and rocky,
just a tiny speck of land,
and I combed that blessed island
with guide book clutched in hand.

Then a happy Greek named Spiros
took me to his little cafe,
Lent me his binoculars
and pointed out my gaffe.
Across the water I could see
all the sights my eyes desired.
I checked my book: wrong island,
then blushingly retired.






This is so phoney! The Colossus of Rhodes stood for only 54 years until it was destroyed when Rhodes was hit by an earthquake in 226 BC. And many years later (600 AD) it was broken up for scrap and taken away. The Acropolis is in Athens, of course, not on any island. The poet is trying to impress...or he has very very good eyesight indeed.

from the Internet - http://www.writebuzz.com/channels/work-details.asp?id=5659

by
Kung Pao

http://www.verybadpoetry.com/

i want to read bad poetry and very poor poetry too
who likes to discriminate
is my literary agent
he doesn't like it when i talk
about hamster breaking ranks
and lines

'bad poetry!' he screams at me
from across the sushi place that sells sushi as bad as bad poetry

'and i'll publish my poems where i want and as many times as i want,' i say calmly or almost calmly to him

i sit down again and have a stomach ache and can't order anything
and that's what i almost say to him

but then my eyes hurt too and i can't really see or it seems like i can't

really see out of them and how

this is going to end too
badly

TULIPS

by Dorothy Evadne Prune

Thou gave me tulips!!
Reminding me of thy two lips
My favourite flower!!
Our two hearts now beat as one,
As hour upon hour
Our love has just begun!!!
Like lovebirds in a tower!

Our love is so sweet
It will
Never go sour!!!!

And - As a sign of our sacred tryst
I shall call you Bob
And you canst call me Doris!!!

With apologies to T S Eliot

That's the way the world ends
That's the way the world ends
That's the way the world ends
But how does this poem end?

Possible last lines:

--With a bang and a whimper, and a whoop-dee-doo
--With a "d," of course
--With Britney pregnant and high again
--With a smile and a song, and 7 little men
--With "The End"

Paul H and some guy named Eliot.

Bad Poets
from the
Aberrant Pew Addict’s
collection

‘Proper’ poets worry me, as they wander oer the moor,
With long tweed coats and unkempt hair,
Seeking mystic inspiration, from neath the broom,
Their consciences wracked lest their poems rhyme.
As they plod through heather t’wards the tor,
Heads full of mindless words and cant,
The deepest meaning – painted words,
So carefully and painstakingly contrived,
That their colleagues will swoon when they read the tripe.

Good poetry starts with a plan,
Moves on through rewrites and amendments,
Unless you're a genius, fit and tan,
Or have genius befriendments.

Bad poetry? Top of the head whimsy.
Hasty hodgepodge, made of things flimsy.
I started this poem not knowing how it would end,
And now it's possible that it ____ ___.

(Another sterling example of why Paul H should not write poetry right after lunch)

Paulie had a liquid lunch
I think we must agree
For 'A Bad Poem' ends with an M
Not a D.

[Morgan Morganstern]

'Learn poetry you idiots',
My English teacher cried,
And started reading Wordsworst,
I very nearly died.

Name of poet?

TWAS MIGHTY HOT IN THE DESERT

by J. Barrington Snyde O'Reilly


Twas mighty hot in the desert
So I fell down on my knees
And I called out to the barman
Barman give me a bottle please
He went out back and rummaged
And brought an empty bottle for me
And said You muppet
You’d better hop it
Because They’ll be coming for thee
But while he was out I managed
To grab some whisky, free.

I am not myself today,
But if I'm not, who am I, then?
Some careful soul who gets to play,
While I must use my acumen
These loathesome lines to pen,
After which rewrite (again!),
And never what I mean to say.....

By someone who is not myself today.