The Spoonbill Generator

Butcher's Lament On Nothing

"What sort of dog is this?" I hear you ask [P]

Whenever my dingo steals a baby [fester]

and hides it under the rhubarb in the allotment. [ellie]

"What sort of fool am I?" I hear you sing [fester]

When ill-bred Russians baulk at carpentry [Apsley]

And bind their furniture together with elastic [TG]

"What sort of thing are you?" I asked you when [fester]

The thousand thousandth thing had come [Apsley]

To join you for the kind of thing things can't do alone [Hamish]

"What sort of verse is this?" I think out loud [Grayman]

as I scratch my nose and add to the confusion [ellie]

Caused by lack of metre, rhyme and scansion in these words [Hamish]

"What sort of cake bites back?" I asked myself [Apsley]

Wiping a smear of blood from my lip [Grayman]

As I turned the cake to dust in the food processor [Hamish]

"What sort of poem wanders thus?" I speechified [Apsley]

as yet more drivel dribbled into the endless ether of endless etherness....... [Mattus Rattus]

..... And suddenly stopped [Grayman]

Only to start again [Apsley]

"What sort of poetry" you say "ends thus - [Hamish]

In a hail of raucus abuse?" [Grayman]

Which you'll just have to imagine because it's too rude to write down... [Hamish]

"What sort of ending ends not?" you observe [Apsley]

Having, obviously, failed to scan the Treasury [TG]

For poems that start at the end and end at the start [Hamish]

Thus! [Apsley]

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? [TG]

Maybe not... [Apsley]


Contributors: P, fester, ellie, Apsley, TG, Hamish, Grayman, Mattus Rattus.
Poem finished: 26th June 2000.