What makes a favorite?

For your profound thinking pleasure I proffer the following question: What makes something your favorite? Some of my favorites are very certain. I prefer Purple above all other colors. Did I say certain? Because I can think of some circumstances when Purple wouldn't be favored at all. (Old ladies hair for example.) So, in honor of my question I will offer you my new favorite poem:

You may think me shallow or fickle

yet firmly I swear it is true

my favorite food is a pickle

but that's not my favorite for you.

For you I would favor a breath mint

you may think my preference rude

for the cost don't think me a skinflint

no importance is place on the food.

These choices are simply explain-ed

The pickle is a favorite treat

once the garlic my breath's truely tainted

mint turns my breath back to sweet.

Please, let me know what makes something your favorite.

Sports and Parenting

No, this is not a post about how many hours I spend coaching my children in baseball or soccer. No this is a humble confession. My children are doomed to be sports illiterate. This afternoon I took Bug to scouts. We talked about the upcoming campout. We played twenty questions with the scouts for a while. Then all of the scouts but Bug and one other headed out to the field to play some football. It was a nice day. The scouting part of scouts was over. Okay. Let's play for a while. Bug says, "I don't want to." "What? Come on, it'll be fun." "I don't like football." "What? Come on, the other scouts are playing, we're all going to play." "Dad, its too violent." "Come on, it'll be two hand touch." Here the other scouts jump in, "Two hand touch? No! Its tackle." "No, I'm not going to explain broken arms to parents." My son, "Dad, I'll play but only if we play tackle." Then it dawns on me. My son has no idea what he is talking about. He's never even played one scrimmage. No idea that tackle is more violent then two hand touch. How can a boy in America not know that tackle can hurt? I once (at about the age of Bug) threatened my procreative abilities by being tackled right on top of a buried sprinkler head. We ended up playing for about a half hour. Bug had a good time. (I had an aneurysm.)

The good news is, I'm no jock. I feel no guilt about this realization. Bug has other experiences that point him squarely toward nerdhood. Just like his father. Now, admittedly, I was pretty popular in High School but if you distilled the sum of my characteristics, I'd end up much more nerd than jock. He'll like making music. (I don't consider someone musically inclined when all they know is the personal details and lyrics of one rock group.) Probably drama. He's already been in chess club.

I'd be more lost if he was a jock. I'm just glad that I can relate to him when he says he doesn't want to play football.

What a little stud.

Poetry

I have come to a realization in the last few years that I can no longer hide. I must come out of the closet. I am a poet. I like reading poetry (though I don't seek it out very much.) I love writing poetry even more. I find myself creating new lyrics for songs every day. Most of my poems don't make it to paper. Most are created with the kids in the car, to the tune of a song, meant to make them laugh. Yet, I love the challenge of playing with words.

Now, I know that there are some that would argue that rhyming isn't good poetry; however, I beg to differ. A good rhyme combined with well planned meter can demonstrate language mastery and literary emotion perhaps better than any other written medium.

Akin to rhyming and just as fun of a literary divice are puns. One of my favorite movie quotes (from the doctor in "Master and Commander") is, "He who would pun would pick a pocket."

So, you may suggest if you like that I am a pick pocket in the poetry closet. I don't care. So in the spirit of poetry I leave you with two poems. One of my own, and one of the bards.


Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;
But then begins a journey in my head,
To work my mind, when body's work's expired:
For then my thoughts, from far where I abide,
Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,
And keep my drooping eyelids open wide,
Looking on darkness which the blind do see
Save that my soul's imaginary sight
Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,
Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night,
Makes black night beauteous and her old face new.
Lo! thus, by day my limbs,
by night my mind,
For thee and for myself no quiet find.

William Shakespeare Sonnet XXVII

I sit to my blog
for other's I write
when they leave precious comments
my soul takes delight

My thoughts then have proven
to tickle your mind
so leave me your message
else I fumble 'round blind

Your feedback so precious
a blurb's all I crave
few word's all I need
to leave my poetry cave.

Pat John Blog post #9