Poetry Friday -- Imitation and (hopefully) Flattery

Wild Atrocity
by Mary Lee Hahn

Glory be to God for silly things --
For running-dives all in a pile of musky autumn leaves;
For rollercoaster rides in the first car alone;
Wet late-March snowball fights; frisbee flings;
Junk food caloric and sweet -- pizza, french fries, sundaes;
And all jokers, their plots and puns and funny bones.

All things humorous, playful, joking, tickly;
Whatever is unplanned, spontaneous (who knows why?)
With smile, grin; laugh, shout; giggle, groan;
They maintain sanity whose beauty is past lunacy:
PRAISE THEM!



Fried Beauty
by R. S. Gwynn

Glory be to God for breaded things--
Catfish, steak finger, pork chop, chicken thigh,
Sliced green tomatoes, pots full to the brim
With french fries, fritters, life-float onion rings,
Hushpuppies, okra golden to the eye,
That in all oils, corn or canola, swim

Toward mastication's maw (O molared mouth!);
Whatever browns, is dumped to drain and dry
On paper towels' sleek translucent scrim,
These greasy, battered bounties of the South:
Eat them.



Pied Beauty
by Gerard Manley Hopkins

Glory be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.



The roundup today is at Wild Rose Reader.