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Dark n Beautiful Nov 2014
How many times have I brought to the table
My Island flavors?
How many times have you read
my inner thoughts:
how many times will I share them again and again

It all began in 2004 from the moment I walked in
You wasn’t there and I didn’t really care
You ***** more than a female
you took on a huge responsibility
so you went out and brought the  singular noun, pronouns
adjectives,  plural verbs, preposition and the infinitives

For a New York minute you should have
brought Heather Taffet  the grave digger for security measures
My poesy is my poesy
The sun always seems to be a symbol of life.
and life is worth living.
Lawrence Hall Jul 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                               To Always be Splitting Infinitives

                              Those who neither know nor care
                        [about split infinitives]…are a happy folk…

                          -Fowler’s Modern English Usage, 1926

I seem to always be
Splitting infinitives
And between you and me
These are definitives
Or should that be spitting infinitives?
D OKane  Oct 2011
Infinitives
D OKane Oct 2011
to see
to touch
to kiss
to taste
to hold
caress
undress
to have

and when
you go
it's always
too long
to wait
for you
Cody Edwards Mar 2010
I reserved a table for the two of us
at the only restaurant in the world
that not only offers atmosphere and setting
but tone and syntax as well.

First some articles for appetizers. They're
easiest on my pocket you know.

An an, a the, and an a.
Let's not even start on the punctuation,
I'm treating you to a rather large meal.
As large as the entire English language,
now back to the articles.
Sure these taste like lint but they still
taste. Petit fours but there you are.
Try to be disinterested or you'll
put me off my food.

Nouns now. My, what a variety.
Bit meaty, eh? These have staying power.
They taste like a bit of everywhere,
and everyone, and everything.
What's that? Surely they're not that bland.
Maybe you need some seasoning.

"Adjective" comes from the
French for "to the word."
So exotic aren't they? These
really are fantastic.
Exquisite, unique, zesty to say the least.
You must admit, they
make the meal worth it.
I hope you're not allergic,
I could have sworn I just
had something "nutty."
Oh, it had nuts "in it"?
There must be some prepositions
mixed in here.

(I'm glad we're getting through
these now, I've never been a big fan of them.
When I was a kid, I would always push my prepositions to the end
of my sentences. You just can't do
that in a joint like this, it seems.)

Ah finally. The verbs are served.
Well-prepared it would seem.
Yes, anything you can do to a verb
they've done to these.
Infinitives (too good to realistically be believed!),
gerunds, and participles (No, not particles. But we
did have some of those at the Japanese restaurant.)
Fairly lean too, as I can't see
any auxiliary fat.

For some reason
those adverbs (just to your left, under that
thesaurus) really go well with this.
Plus those adjectives from earlier, rather pleasantly.

Now a brief selection
of conjunctions, but don't ruin
yourself. They're not a meal of themselves,
just a link to...

Oh! Look at those interjections.
So delicate, so (Wow!) incisive.
I told you to keep your appetite.
Well, just try a little of this. Goodness, me!

And then everyone proceeds to
die  
from a split infinitive.
© Cody Edwards 2010
savanna lai  Nov 2014
infinitives
savanna lai Nov 2014
to have,
(i had you
for a very long time)
to hold,
(i never
held you,
not truly)
to love,
(i believe that
i will continue to love you
for a while)
to see,
(light,
or whatever visual interpretation
of affection
floats your boat)
to speak,
(for so long
that my voice becomes hoarse)
to cry,
(for help,
for love,
both lost and newfound)
to cling,
(in desperation,
to a glass chain that's falling apart)
to sleep,
(or rather, not)
to fall,
(in love
again
with the idea of you and me)
to lose,
(you again)
to think
(of what it was like
to have you.)
Lawrence Hall Jan 2017
Semester Exam

Fluorescents flicker and fall upon bowed heads
And printed letter-paper, organized
By title, paragraph, number, and line,
Interrogations set in Bookman Old Style

And then words fall, flung bravely to each sheet
As desperate, inky thoughts flailing for breath
While to battered be by split infinitives
Demanding an A, praying for a prom date.

The paper's a mess, one’s mind is in shreds
Fluorescents flicker and fall upon bowed heads
Desperado Dan
Is a man with a plan
To cash in a bit of Kensington
On some high grade *****
Cos right now he's got a couple of scores
But not a great deal more to loose

You see, our Dan is a master of the modern day quill
He works an open office, clocking in and out at will
But after reading all the greats from his and every bygone age
He lives in a time where the mp3 subverts the written page

So night and day he hums away
Searching for that hit chorus
And he knows you can't cut corners
When it comes to tanking up on creative juices

A Desperado is larger beer spiked with tequila
Some say it's for scoundrels to make charming girls easier
But our Dan's quest is noble.
He has a dream we'd all like to believe in
He simply wants to do his whole life’s work in just one evening
And a Desperado seems to conjure all six hats within one head
So if two minds are better than one...well, nuff said

He dilutes them at first, pulling the wool over his own eyes
Until, catching reflections on the glass, he sees through the disguise.
And before long you'll find him chugging straight from the bottle
Then, in a blur of paper and pen, Dan writes like there's no tomorrow.

He writes and writes and writes some more
a couplet, a bridge, an underscore
Ploughing verses like trenches through the ****** white paper
Dropping napalms just to see what pops it's head above the wreckage.

Then, surveying the new landscape, he quarries in every direction…

Linearly; because it's most straightforward like that
Circularly; because they used to think the world was flat

Logically; because... Well duh!
Laterally; which gives the brain a stir

Diagonally; some kinda a + b = c rap from back in the day
In reverse; because sometimes we unknowingly face the wrong way

Unapologetically
Down dead ends
Just to see the view

He picks up clichés and looks under them for clues

Desperado Dan
Calls for desperate measures
As the evening wears on
He indulges all his earthly pleasures

And down they go with a Yo ** **
What a ***** desperado!
***** I say! Now he's mixing with ***
Still his pencil flies with a blistered thumb

'E starts to drop 'is H's
And forgets to cross his l's...sorry t's
He paces back and forwards
An he talks like mushy peas

Rummaging frantically through chaotic pockets
Conjunctives falling to the floor
He can't find the word he's after, but who cares? There’s plenty more!
He begins to vengefully split infinitives in two
And hurl metaphors across the kitchen
Sending mountains of ******* up ***** of paper flying
Like snowballs after the thaw
Which slowly melt into puddles of lonely vowels and consonants.
Long after he has gone.

----------------------------------------------------------­---------------------------------

But all that was before the "Doodley Dee"
And his dream came true with a change of key
The song which people can't help to hum
From OAPs to the I-generation
And people hummed it all over
And in all sorts of weather
Until someone decided we should hum it forever.
And they paid Desperado Dan for every hum
Not bad work for a blistered thumb

So now our Dan seems a lot less desperate.
From time to time he evens finds an hour or two to rest a bit
Sitting on the veranda of his studio in the south of France.
Applying the finishing touches to another comedy romance.
Sipping a very fine Sauvignon, no Desperado in sight.

They're all safely packed away in the cellar

Just in case he gets the urge

Late at night.
Sridevi  Dec 2010
Lost Grammar
Sridevi Dec 2010
My tenses –
PRESENT
PAST
…future…
Creep into my soul in unison
...and in a voice
dripping with PASSIVE eternity
Scream
C
O
N
T
I
N
U
O
U
S

Momentarily deafened
I give up on GRAMMAR…

And gather the strewn words

Maybe…

I would need them to fill the gaps...
... in my verse brimming with INFINITIVES...
Cody Edwards Mar 2011
Mother bear in a waterfall
With bigger thoughts than blonde harlots
Eating porridge,
Fallen starlets with outer space in their hair.

Just you wait;
I'll be the happiest little sonofabitch
You've ever seen.

Some small consolation, if any.
That weekend we spent with our
Necks perpendicular to our spines,
Of course I still remember the films we watched.

I condition my hair with split infinitives
And live off the poisoned dew that settles
Every morning in my closet.

Turn your little black dress inside-out,
I've got this magic idea for a recipe
But we're going to need some ants
And that crazy Harryhausen dream you've got up in your attic.

Ten or twelve little blond kids up
On the cliff, each ten or twelve years old
And dancing with a flame-Buddha called "Home".

Let's spend this week underwater,
I'd much rather give up my weight and my due
If it ensured me any small hour
With you. Oh, god how I love you anymore.

I may have told you this a while ago,
But did you know the first Pledge of Allegiance
Put us some good height above God?

Sometimes I find the sugar in my gas tank
Makes for a rough start in the morning,
Not that I particularly want to go anywhere,
But it's what I've thought that counts.

He's a bit upset that I skipped movie last night:
But I can't play horizontal baseball
With my violent, violent imaginary friend.

The Rubik's cube beats deep in my chest
Without a hand to cheat and rearrange the stickers.
Claude enunciates something queer into my ear
And turns off the lamp with a snap.
© Cody Edwards 2010
Lawrence Hall May 2022
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com  
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

Former President Trump Splits Two Infinitives and Botches a Number of Subject, Verb, and Adjective Constructs While Proposing the Arming of Teachers

    “...it's time to finally allow highly trained teachers to safely and
     discreetly concealed carry, let them concealed carry.”

                      -Former President Donald J. Trump
                    to the National Rifle ***., 27 May 2022

All teachers trample the Constitution
All teachers promote contempt for the Flag
All teachers should be in an institution
All teachers are weird (and that one’s a fxg)
All teachers despise the military
All teachers should be slowly microwaved
All teachers hate meat; they’re vegetary
All teachers hate Jesus; they can’t be saved
All teachers are evil; the children are harmed:

And thus, they say, all teachers should be armed

Previously published as “Texas’ Proposed Concealed Carry Law” in Dispatches from the Colonial Office, 2018, available from amazon.com.
Dispatches from the Colonial Office
bobby burns  Mar 2015
tannins
bobby burns Mar 2015
buckeye flour,
almonds,
acorns,
tree-bark,
cacao,
wine

your only criticism is that i split infinitives and spit bitters.
Gene  Dec 2016
Untitled
Gene Dec 2016
I.
This is just another bad poem
Just vomited-thoughts-left-on-paper poem
This is a collection of grammatical errors
This would surely make my English teacher cringe
But no worries, I didn’t write this for her

II.
This bad poem is for you

May my subject and verb disagreement
remind you of all those misunderstandings that lead to raised voices
and nights where I cried myself to sleep

Sentence construction was never my strength, it still isn’t, maybe that’s why you never truly understood me—
called me difficult and bipolar
You said that I was too much

Did it ever occur to you that you might just misread me, like homonyms,
same words but with different meanings
misread my jealousy with accusations,
my concern for excessive affection

You said that I loved you too much
but darling, did you even love me at all?

Did I put too much meaning on your words,
turned them into similes and metaphors?
Turned your literal statements into figures of speech
You told me that you liked me,
so I blissfully interpreted it as a hyperbolic expression— called it love when obviously it wasn’t

III.
I was never good at using punctuations
I put too much commas,
unnecessary, misused, I kept trying to hold on
Afraid of the inevitable end,

Switched to semi-colons in an attempt to make it a few words longer

Because despite all our grammatical errors
no matter how shameful our piece of literature was to the English language

It was beautiful to the untrained eye,
To those who read poetry as it is
To those who don’t dig deep in search of true meaning behind the metaphors
It was beautiful to me

But I eventually learned that infinitives and infinities are different,
in spite of sharing infinite as the root word
Like our love,

started with something so promising
but unlike most novels,
there’s no happy ending

So I accepted defeat,
accepted the inevitable and bitter end
No more committing the same mistakes over and over again,
the same words over and over again,

Accepted the fact that synonyms existed,
words with the same meaning but also entirely different
new and unfamiliar, foreign and peculiar

IV.
I accepted defeat
No more commas or semi-colons
We have reached the couplet of our free formed sonnet—

I was never good with endings, I don’t think I’ll ever be,
So darling I hand you the pen, set us both free.
061016 / 6:36 pm

— The End —