For Better or Worse, He Presents More Terse Verse

My terse verse file grows thick with entries from readers who cherish this literary form and deplore their inability to get their efforts published.

The late columnists Matt Weinstock and Franklin Pierce Adams having vacated the field, I like to do what I can, occasionally, to put terse verse in my window, so to speak, in memory of its late master, Richard Armour.

Barbara Taylor of Mission Viejo gets into the spirit of the medium by defining a common affliction: Horripilation is a grandiose word That sounds like a fatal disease. But all that it means is the flesh of a bird More precisely, goose bumps, if you please.

And with a stab at Ogden Nash wordplay: A fine electrician named Pruitt Could fix anything if you blew it. When asked whether he Could run lines to the sea, He replied, “Why, of course I conduit.”

Kay Cammer says she has sold 500 verses, but never submitted this one: I would love my neighbors more, If they didn’t live next door .

Gerry Pittenger submits one that was published in Matt Weinstock’s column. I’m sure Matt wouldn’t mind its being aired again. She calls it “Feminine Math:” Remember, dear, those bygone years Of candlelight and wine? So how come you are middle - aged And I’m just twenty-nine? Marjorie L. Schwartz offers this one in tribute to her late husband: Imagine if you can A sculptor, a student of art, a pianist A Renaissance man; A lover, a professor, the star of the courts, My Renaissance husband, Berny Schwartz .

Henry Cimring enters the following in the competition for the shortest verse with the longest title: Poetic Thoughts Upon Receiving a Traffic Citation From a Uniformed Officer for Doing What Everyone Else Gets Away With I! Why?

And another in the same genre: Oh! To Trod the Paths of Thoreau Once Mo’ Poison oak Is no joke.

Ann Lawler Ibbotson writes that her cat Tiger Tail was king of the garden until “a blue jay” moved in. In their preliminary skirmishes the bird won. She pecked at the cat, pulled out bunches of his hair and sent him into retreat. “Then, one morning, I saw a heap of blue feathers.” She was inspired to write the following, which she calls “Bye Bye Birdie.” You are no more my feathered friend And while I sadly grieve your end, I am ashamed. A bird on wing Outwitted by a grounded thing. Now, though I miss your chirping chat, My admiration’s with the cat.

Which in turn inspires me to this: While Tiger Tail may be the winner My sympathy is with his dinner: A scrub, not blue jay , to be exact, As a matter of ornithological fact.

(I dedicate that to Dr. Henry Childs, the ornithologist, who insists that the saucy bird who inhabits our back yards is indeed a scrub jay, not a blue jay. )

I am puzzled by this entry from John C. Hassett, which he calls “On the Growing Need for Bilingualism in L.A.”: I doubt a gorilla Would eat a tortilla

The only point I can see in that is that gorilla is pronounced gor- ill -a and tortilla is pronounced tor- tee -ya, and never the twain shall meet.

It may be that a Spanish-speaking person, on first seeing the word gorilla in print might be inclined to pronounce it go- ree -ya, and an English-speaking person might pronounce tortilla as tor- till- a, but I have never heard either. But it suggests cute lyrics for a musical comedy: I say gor-ill-a And you say go-ree-ya, Let’s call the whole thing off

Eileen Hunt Schilz responds in verse to those who bad-mouth Los Angeles: Earthquakes, mudslides And drive-by shootings; Hit-run drivers and Midnight lootings Hollywood hot tubs With pizza and suds, Livin’ on the Rim With good friends and crazies Stickin’ right here Till I’m pushin’ up daisies.

To which I add this lament: The difficulty with writing Verse about Los Angeles Is that it doesn’t rhyme with anything.