The Tenth Annual BAD POETRY CONTEST!
I know you’ve been waiting all year for me to host my 10th annual BAD POETRY CONTEST at the blog — so here is another reason to go on living. One week from today is my birthday, and I always try to celebrate by inviting all the bad poetry my friends can muster. Just go to the bottom of this blog, hit “comments,” and post some lousy piece of doggerel as your way of joining in the celebration. It can be a crappy couplet, a crummy free verse, a lousy limerick (let’s stay away from rhyming with the city of “Nantucket”), or any other ditty you create that shows what a sensitive and thoughtful artist you are, when you don’t happen to be worrying about your lack of a book contract or whining about the bad job of marketing your publisher is doing for you.
For those not in the know, this contest grows from my belief that every poet has the same message, which can be subtly summed up this way: “LOOK AT ME! I AM SENSITIVE AND REFLECTIVE AND NOBODY UNDERSTANDS ME! SO I’LL SHOW THEM HOW DEEP I AM BY WRITING POETRY!” (Feel free to edit that statement if you’re truly deep and meaningful.) I want you to know that I’m here for all you poets. In fact, I was once accused of being sensitive, and have occasionally been forced to reflect on something — that is, until I could grow up and get over it. Therefore, I’ve set aside the next week just for you. Write! Create! Sit and contemplate your navel! Do…um…whatever it is you poets do while the rest of us are out earning a living. Then send in your bad poetry! There are no rules, except that you don’t send in “birthday” poems. This isn’t a celebration of me aging — it’s a celebration of terrible writing, of faux depth, of deepful meaningness. So break out that sensitivity (with Trump the candidate, we’re going to need it) and demonstrate your reflexocity by creating something completely lame. Your fellow writers will love you for it.
And the best news of all… the winner, chosen by an experienced team of expert bad poets (me, and maybe a friend, if he agrees to buy the Guinness) will receive a special GRAND PRIZE: a genuine signed copy of my bestselling book The Y2K Family Survival Guide!!! That’s right — the book that saved western civilization as we know it! (Had it not been for all those stupid Y2K books by people like me and Mike Hyatt and Shauntee Feldhahn years ago, I’d probably be blogging in Chinese this very moment. In the dark, maybe. So just keep that in mind, Comrade. Mike Hyatt went on to become President of Thomas Neslon. Shauntee has written mumerous bestsellers. And I…uh…well, there’s no proof that the publishing of my book led directly to my being let go as a publisher with Time-Warner, but we’ve got people investigating that angle right now.)
Your little piece of literary history awaits. Write!
What can I do to make one see,
I do so love bad po-e-try.
It is, to me, a sort of balm,
And writing it just makes me calm.
For each time that I sit and write,
I show my depth, reveal my plight.
I’m really a reflective sort,
Hiding in my writing fort,
Revealing sensitivity,
For rhyme and meter, brevity.
So come join my happy clan,
Write something – show you’re a man!
(Or a woman, if you aren’t home
to the Y chromosome.)
We await your craft and work,
Know that we will go beserk
When, upon this blog we see,
All your best bad po-e-try.
— The Most Reverend and Holy Jerry Chip MacGregor, President of the Bad Poetry Society
55 Comments
Owed to Depression
“I’m sad.”
“It’s tedious,”
you reply.
“To sit and mope because you can’t cope
with the tangledness life tends to tie.”
Yes! Truly bad, Lynn He! Thanks very much for offering your awfulness to the world!
The Happy Tree
Mommy said I’d see the tree.
See the tree and me and thee.
Put the three of us right there.
Where the pond did urge us wear –
A loincloth.
****
Daddy told about the gun.
Hid it in the hole in one –
Tree within the orchard there.
Where the pond did urge us wear –
A monkey suit.
****
Happy happy happy tree.
Making merry ceaselessly.
Joining in the parson’s lair,
Where the pond did urge us wear –
A golden hat.
The above Bad Poet (a former Bad Poetry Winner, I might add) has been urged by all of those close to him to put the loincloth back on. No photos exist, or I”d be posting them.
My heart is taken by another, ladybug.
Broken in two, like black and red crunchy wings, ladybug.
The pain like a forgotten aphid I’m trying to smother, ladybug.
Shudder, how wholly foul do you steer—a last breath sings, ladybug!
It is not I who dreams what could be, ladybug,
But who can guess where you store your effects, ladybug?
Freedom to walk is wonderfully oh so free, ladybug,
But, alas, my dreamy promenade in a forest glade with unwatched steps, ladybug.
Alas, my dreamy promenade through the forest of bad poetry has struck Peter. Alas.
Salt-tinted liquid excretes from all two of my tear ducts
Why, oh, why, have I lost my once-plentiful lucks?
I shan’t forget the blue of the ring-like muscle controlling your pupil
Now that you’re gone, my sadness is quadruple
It broke all four chambers of my blood-pumping organ
when you left me for that lousy Morgan
It’s time to take matters into my own pair of five-digited extremities
Because I’m 100% certified lonesome and there is no remedy
My weepful-juices are sloshing off my cheeks; it’s too much to bear
Bang! The sacs on either side of your trachea will stop moving air
The hour for payback has struck, though I have nothing to gain
I’ll embodify your dread nightmares and unwave your brain
Then I guess I’ll find a new boyfriend.
I’m so glad you rhymed “lucks” with “ducks.” I know it wasn’t your first choice…
LOL
Saviour
Through the long, long
Night
Of my suffering, I
Dreamt
You were there, in the Somewhere.
Suddenly, bold, you appeared,
Flowing orange locks matching
Face, aglow.
Could you be the one to
Save me
From the dark menace and
Return us to the light?
In your capable hands,
“Yuge hands,” you promised
“I guarantee there is no problem, I
guarantee you.
Okay?
Just ask
My lovely, lovely daughter.”
When you shouted
That you were very, very rich,
I believed.
“Believe me.” you said.
“Don’t be
A stupid loser.”
My heart knows the truth.
And when you shouted,
“I’ll build a wall, did you know that?”
I whispered, “Why are you shouting?”
“I’ll make America
Great!”
You shouted. Even louder.
With a bible
And a taco bowl
We shall
Overcomb.
He has written a Bad Poem (“and this is a terrifically bad poem, by the way, everyone agrees, he has terrific poetry ability – there’s no problem with his poetry ability, believe me… he’s going to win this one bigly”). Here’s hoping some readers actually GET this joke.
I stand in ahh.
Odd Socks:
Odd socks, odd socks
Sitting in a box
Always disappearing
And never reappearing.
They never seem to match,
Or we always have to patch
Because they have a hole
Oh what a bother and a bore.
When the washer eats one in a flash
The other one goes in the trash.
Then we have to buy some more
And go and get them from the store.
I think that I will never see,
More socks in our Bad Po-e-try.
Dear Chip. I had a question but didn’t want to waste any keystroke which may be useful in sucking so bad it might be good, so it’s in the form of an entry. And please, do not update the restraining order from 2009.
the contest, the fantasy, the multiple entries
I ask of thee, is there a “per customer” limit on poems? I’m on a roll, like toilet paper but rollier. I make up for lost years. Like the years prior to 2009 (the year of The Restraining Order, due to a tantrum for not even placing top ten) when I knew of no such honor to be awful. And all the years after (except 2013) when I thought so hard of magical poems I could smell the inside of my head.
I forgot to enter.
Which brings us to 2013.
I was so close. 2nd place (alias Junior) https://www.macgregorandluedeke.com/blog/all-bad-things-must-come-to-an-end/. So close to Winning. Winning How to Good-bye Depression: If you constrict anus 100 times everyday. Malarky? or Effective Way?).
I pictured myself, my honored self, accepting my award of How to Good-bye Depression: If you constrict anus 100 times everyday. Malarky? or Effective Way?)
from you, my bleary eyed one.
I made my acceptance speech.
We went out to dinner
I gazed upon your bleary eyes, blue. Blue as toilet bowl cleaner.
and then i asked if you could hem my pants. They were frayed at the bottom. It tickled and made me think spiders were crawling up my leg
we had a lovely evening
I’m dreaming again
Good News: The restraining order has been lifted! You are a free woman, Tricia! Free to be yourself! Free to send in Bad Poetry! Free to take more of those drugs that caused this problem in the first place! Free to use as many exclamation points as me!!!!!
poetic numbers: 3 poems part 1 of 2
1 is unacceptable and won’t be discussed further.
hate it
16 is the number of pets, cats in particular, one should adore. At a certain time (not 1 time)
love it
There are 21 pizza rolls in a family pack, good for a person (I regret now banning the number 1 and therefore rescind my restrictions)
eat it
does 1 remote control in the hand equal 2 on the coffee table?
question it
………………………….
3 friends, Kurtis and Lee
4 were sinners,
1 wore tinfoil
2 had to pee
Part 2
21 pizza rolls divided by 16 cats equals 1 or 3 half eaten friends
“Adding numbers to your poems always improves them.” – Bad Poet Tricia Sutton
Wither and Die From My Hi
If I told you I love that tree or that it’s the most beautiful tree
tomorrow it will be chopped down
I can’t tell you my pants size as suddenly I will
pop a button
If I told you my favorite song the station will never air it
again
If I told you I love rain, my geographical location will suffer
a 73 year drought.
I once told you I loved “Loving Spoonfuls” pudding cups.
They are no longer in existence. (my favorite cereal too but I can’t remember its name. There were dinosaurs in the box. I’ll remember only after I hit send. Or not)
If I love you today i will hate you tomorrow
hate
I can tell you only one thing. As sure as the sun rises and the moon too, nothing can stop it. It cannot be undone. There will be no consequence for saying it. Nothing can change it. Nothing can hurt it.
It is 9:46am
boom
And I can also tell you only one thing: You’re spending too much time on Bad Poetry, Tricia.
The Big Easy Blank Love
Love came not easy. Not easy. She sought a blank canvas, untouched, porous and white. He sat staring blank, blank as a canvas, only not white, and not porous, and not untouched (he had a scar), but a blank either way, blinking, blankly, eating a scone, slowly. She knew.
She knew. (And she knew her Bad Poetry. This qualifies.)
COMPOST LIFE
You think you have it so tough-
Well, my life is the one that really stinks.
You sit there, you whiner, and even your fingernails are clean.
Well, look at me!
My life is like compost!
You and your precious little fingernails,
You don’t have a clue.
Compost! That’s my actual life!
Everything smelly and cast-off and moldy.
Everything that nobody wants,
it just gets dumped on me,
on the pile of rot that is
MY LIFE.
Eggshells once filled with the very richness of life,
now broken and empty,
heaved out onto My Life.
The cruddy grounds that once made
the steaming richness of the coffee of life,
scattered now on the compost of
My Life.
You ate the grapefruit of possibility,
and then
you tossed the empty halves of peel,
with just that bitter membrane stuff
Onto the compost of
My Life.
All that other stuff from your lip-smacking days
Piles up on the rotting compost of
My Life.
Worms. Stench.
Well, the joke’s on you, Precious.
Because all this decay is turning into
rich soil
And I will rise again,
actually fecund with possibility and hope
Because that’s how compost works.
Just in case you didn’t know.
Ha!
Then who’s the winner in life,
my friend?
We’ve decided we won’t be visiting, Nice Lady.
Who blames you!
Ode to a Dark and Stormy Night
It was a dark and stormy night
And murder was afoot
As a bullet was shot with the thunder
And lightning showed the way
A body swam in blood
Though how a dead body swam
We’ll never know
Oh, old dark and stormy night
Where or where did the rain and wind go?
Ode to a dark and stormy night
Methinks Nora understands Bad Poetry.
Can’t say I understand poetry, but I know bad when it comes to me. LOL
Once, twice, thrice now I’ve entered your contest for pundits, and poets, and such.
I’ve learned you like yearners, thinkers, big-word users.
Alas for us third-grade rhymers
Even in failing at poetry we fail.
As I contemplate life and the geist within us, searching to find poignant commonality
I’m captivated by poignant, the oy sound, the spelling
And p words like pumpkin and pumpernickel
Which make me crave eating and romanticized spying
Oh what am I doing and where am I going?
Shall I count the ways?
Shall I compose an odious ode?
I think not therefore I am not
My love of language strings together words that sound exquisite
If they contain q and x, so much the better.
If they contain scarpulcruous words that gyle and gimble in the wabe
Then like the mome raths, I’m outgrabed.
This road could go ever and ever on
Would you award your highest prize to the rambler, the reacher, the scurrilous keeper?
Existential I would say it matters not, but that it matters
But some roads lead to Mordor, where the shadows are
So I shall seek the Jabberwocky at the end of mine.
Beware the jackalopes.
Oh, Lisa, that is simply wonderful! You transport me to another place. Er… not sure where, but another place!
Wonderfully bad, Lisa. Thanks.
Lady Lackadaisical
Licks a lollipop
Lemon-lime lullaby
La La La
Oo-la-la!
“Mary had a little lamb
Her father shot it dead.
Now Mary takes her lamb to school
Between two chunks of bread!” .. I stole this from Peta Conwell on FB. I do not know her, but it was too irresistible and I must be honest.
No stealing of Bad Poetry, soulsupply. Sorry. You’re being disqualified, and will NOT be receiving a copy of “The Y2K Family Survival Guide.” Try to find a reason to go on living.
Though I should be working
I’m really lurking
Admiring Chip’s wit from afar
A clever twist of the tongue
A fancy turn of the phrase
Confirms what we know: he’s a *star*
Professing to hate the art form of po-e-try
He slings out rhyming words among his co-te-rie
Daring us all to compete
Yet he seems so sensitive
And shows such depth
His talent is pretty dang hard to beat.
So with hat in hand
And kerchief to nose
I hold my head high in defeat
And raise my glass
(of Guiness no less)
To hail he who is slightly off-beat
Let’s lead the cheer
Using utmost di-plo-macy
Here’s to Chip MacGregor
King of Bad Po-e-try!
–The Most Irreverant and Undinstinguished, Kiki Hamilton, Poetry Serf
The judges are debating to see if this is truly bad, Kiki…
LOL I should get partial credit for typos!
Keys
Where are you?
Where are you?
Where are you?
Oh, there you are.
No, wait, these are my old keys.
Why do I keep you?
You are of no use to me right now.
But what if I need you after all?
Like that platonic friend in high school,
You decide to marry if you’re both still single at 50,
Backup life.
Backup love.
Backup keys.
Filed to the junk drawer of your mind.
Backup keys.
What do you go to?
Why are you here?
I guess you should stay.
Of course you did, Stephanie. This poem is full of deepfulness. It exudes reflexocity. Nice work.
Someone is singled out for celebration
like a saint the Church decides on
counting up miracles
good works in multitudes.
Is there an act left to sanctify
some area of living not media-blessed?
Oh my, I like that. I’m not sure it comes anywhere near BAD, though. It’s really good!
No, it’s bad, Nice Lady. Trust me.
The soles of my feet
on your face as you sleep
my love
for you, tides of hibiscus longing
universal Earth Mother Bisquick
In China they see the moon, too
mothers say, “If you dug a hole deep enough…”
New Jersey
You wake, you breathe
you remove the mask we all wear
but you only at night
impenetrable, waking night, dark
smells like socks in here.
# # #
Wow, Jim, you have real talent. I’m humbled. The vision of Earth Mother Bisquick is sublime.
i completely agree. And the smell of socks.
Yes. The socks.
You crack me up. I’m looking for you on Twitter.
Mother Earth Bisquick. Fabulous, Jim.
Here’s my philosophy:
Wherever I go, I have to see
The idiots clamoring hard to lee.
So I will not go, I will not see,
I will stay at home and just be me.
By myself.
Sniff. Touching. As background music, let’s play “All BY Myself…”
Ode to Love
my love for you is like a pair of rabbit ears, the ones you used to put on the television so you could watch “Perry Mason” on Sunday nights.”
Spotty reception and with rerun-.
s. But in my bubble-bath daydream thoughts of you, I scratch at mosquito bites,
because I didn’t have Off! or Skin-so Soft, so this line is done.
I must get over this love like malignant animal magnetism, as the Christian Scientists would call it, and then give it last rites.
If they were Catholic, which they aren’t, and I’m not poking fun.
I’m getting my love self-poetry published on Createspace because my mom thinks I deserve acolytes.
the end
-Carrie Stuart Parks
Thank you, Chip, for letting me share this most sensitive side. It’s dedicated to Harvey B. Twit, my college hamster, who was eaten by Shasta, mom’s dog. I found the body.
Oh my. LOVE THIS!!!
Thank you, Lisa! Maybe I should be a writer… :-0
Lovely, Policeartist. Sensitive, deep, and mentions Skin-so-soft. What could be better?