‘So to Speak’ and Other Poetry by Jane Blanchard

So to Speak

My teen-aged son talks not as I do;
I cannot teach him, yet I try to.

If I should use subjunctive mood,
He indicates an attitude.

Instruction in the active voice
Is met with his more passive choice.

When I distinguish “different from”
From “different than,” he just plays dumb.

As far as problem pronouns go,
He claims that anyone would know.

Too often he resorts to slang
Instead of giving half a dang.

Too seldom he reveals desire
To place with care a modifier.

Upon a whim, he pulls a shiv
To fast split some infinitive.

Still, over sup, I dare maintain
That “forehead” rhymes with “horrid,” plain.

My son looks up, takes me to task:
“Who’s Longfellow?” my son does ask.

“Why should I ever follow one
Who once rhymed ‘girl’ and ‘curl’ for fun?”

He then persists in saying “fore-head,”
Insisting nothing else be more said.

Hegemony

There looms an even larger crisis
Than Panama or Trump or ISIS:
Crustaceans from America
Have caused this latest brouhaha.

Each male is said to have a pincher
So big that it becomes the clincher
In rituals with European
She-lobsters during mating season.

The offspring, though, researchers tell,
May suffer from a thinner shell
Than is ideal to thrive beyond
The western regions of the pond.

So what to do? Why, pass some laws
Against Homari with such claws!

SOP

(Standard Operating Procedure)

I never answer any call
That shows ID unknown;
Anonymous cannot persuade
Myself to get the phone.

Thus, any private number/name
Must speak to my machine;
When I see data incomplete,
I always choose to screen.

Jane Blanchard lives and writes in Georgia.  Her chapbook Unloosed is available from Kelsay Books. 

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