Archive for the ‘Quatrains Humor’ Category

Night Writing (Quatrain)

Friday, May 5th, 2023

On lim’rick verse I often toil,
Compelled to burn the midnight oil.
And when my writing’s all for naught,
My sleep is fraught; I rock and roil.

Buzzy Quatrain

Tuesday, February 8th, 2022

Here’s a quatrain for a change of pace:

Be careful when using
A popular buzzword.
You’re likely to learn it’s
A “formerly-was-word.”

Fair Game

Monday, April 6th, 2015

Fair Game
By Madeleine Begun Kane

I would never purport
to engage in a sport
unless mockery counts;
I do massive amounts.

I make comments in sport
that make some people snort.
I’m unsporting, some claim,
When at pols I take aim.

But those pols are fair game.
Their behavior’s to blame,
And they reap what they sow.
So it’s on with the show.

My political humor is on my other blog.

How I Met My Husband

Saturday, March 28th, 2015

My come-hither look
was all that it took.
Mark​ at first tried to book,
but returned … on the hook.

As Mark likes to say, true story:

Mark spots me, already seated, while he’s walking through a half-empty Long Island Rail Road car. I smile at him. He smiles at me. And then, instead of sitting across from me, Mark keeps walking and goes into another half-empty train car.

A couple of minutes later he rethinks this, turns around, comes back, and sits across from me.

Seven weeks later Mark proposes, and I say yes, wondering what took him so long.

(All this happened way back in 1977.)

Yet Another Anti-Winter Poem

Friday, March 20th, 2015

Yet Another Anti-Winter Poem
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Oh damn you winter! Go away!
Why can’t you take a hint today?
Intruding on our spring delights
With snow is NOT within your rights.

The calendar has made it clear
It’s spring. So why are YOU still here?
I’ve foolishly already stored
Our boots and shovels, long abhorred.

I’m forced to fetch them one more time
For duties not at all sublime.
Your crime of trespass? No mere gaffe!
I just might sue on spring’s behalf.

A Playful Quatrain

Wednesday, January 7th, 2015

There’s wit that is lambent.
There’s humor that’s bent.
I’m feeling quite sheepish;
Had to search what “lambent” meant.

(Inspired by the Twitter #WordStew prompt: LAMBENT.)

View my Lambent quatrain image here.

Verse for the Birds (Limerick and Quatrain)

Monday, January 5th, 2015

Happy “National Bird Day!”

A birder who’d frequently swear
His toupée was in fact his real hair,
Was caught by a gust,
And his toupe, not just mussed,
Flew the coop, leaving pate rather bare.

*****

“A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” —
People tell me that all of the time.
Such axioms give me a pain in the tush.
Were I queen, I would make them a crime.

Happy Peculiar People Day (January 10)

Thursday, January 9th, 2014

Here’s my two-verse quatrain poem, in honor of Peculiar People Day. (January 10)

Ode To Peculiar People
By Madeleine Begun Kane

My peculiar predilection:
I like people who are odd.
I’ll applaud a little strangeness,
But find “normal” humans flawed.

That makes perfect sense: they tell me
I am rather “weird” myself.
I don’t mind critiques and putdowns—
Just don’t call me “off the shelf.”

Cold and Bothered (Quatrain)

Tuesday, January 7th, 2014

Cold and Bothered (Quatrain)
By Madeleine Begun Kane

I live in a town where it’s pleasant to stroll.
We do most of our errands on foot.
But it’s frightfully cold. “Let’s stay home,” I cajole.
Forget milk! Let’s be smart and stay put.

(January 11 is National Milk Day.)

Hoping For Humor (Sundry Verse)

Thursday, March 3rd, 2011

Today I’ve written four poems on a theme called hope. There’s a pair of quatrains, one haiku, and a limerick — something for everyone, or no one, as the case may be:

Hope springs eternal—
a “truism” some speak.
Yes, hope springs eternal,
until it springs a leak.

*****

Alexander Pope
wrote about hope.
His eternal quote
helps some folks cope.

*****

Showing up to vote—
a yearly exercise in
unrequited hope.

*****

A gal who is often caught moping
And is terribly dreadful at coping
Drives her family mad.
Things have gotten so bad,
That they’re hoping to hear she’s eloping.

*****

(Inspired by Haiku Wednesday’s hope prompt and Poets United quotation prompt. For more optimistic poems see Friday Poetically.)