Parking Political Satire

Satire of the political kind

never strays far from my mind

Arguments, debates and fluff,

I suppose are necessary kinds of stuff.

While sorting out what’s right or wrong,

this country seems devoid of song!

Rick Mercer’s rants, Terry Fallis book

make humour of Canada’s political nooks.

So here we can sit, grassroots all around

while Harper’s cronies pave the ground.

“Satire is traditionally the weapon of the powerless against the powerful.”

~ Molly Ivins

Humour Is

Humour is a fleeting thing, 

its sound is just a laugh

A sense of joy from funny things, dancing butterflies in the grass.

Humour doesn’t ask for much, it merely sits and waits

for someone or something cheery to land on any gate.

Humour is in every smile that brightens up a day.

There is no charge for humour, it’s just a give away.

Humour is a feeling, that comes with something fun.

Everyone feels different whether satire, wit, or pun

Humour is an open door through which we all can pass

when we open up our hearts and welcome in a laugh.

“Humor is mankind’s greatest blessing.”

~  Mark Twain

As the Crow Flies

Humour sat in a corner waiting for some fun,

when along came brother Charles, always ready with a pun!

So humour got up to thank him, when along came sister Sue. She’d been told her wit was dry. It just made a sneeze ~ ‘AACHOO’.

Humour just shook his head at them, went to the window to stare 

at a big black crow flapping about in the wild and windy air.

So if this little rhyme has caused a tiny bit of a grin

I’m ever so glad, for this rhyme is a little, tiny bit thin!

“You take stuff from different places, and sometimes you stick 

a line in because it rhymes, not because it makes sense.”

~ Van Morrison

Grief Recycled

Humour caught off guard one day by clouds, lightening, thunder ~ a horrendous storm crashed in flooding my soul

sending humour flinging away with a violent rush of deep, deep grief and anguish

voices echoed around me like fog horns in a harbour

slowly, slowly creeping through thick, thick cloud

I felt for life around me.

Slowly heavy cloud faded from 

deep slate grey to 

dirty gray to 

brightening gray 

by the warmth of family and friends

I tried to share in their laughter but

my voice was tinny and false

my heart still raw and sore

My children and gardens

kittens and puppies 

anything that grew

the only real softness I allowed to come close to my heart.

One day ~ I don’t know when ~

I tentatively stepped into the light of real joy

tears of laughter washed cloudy residue from my eyes

my heart glowed with gladness.  

The glow was short lived but I knew 

that I would return to the joy.

                         *****

Today I smiled deep inside my heart when

I saw my neighbour’s calico kitty today 

perched on empty recycling bags.

laughter and joy perch on my tattered old memories

recycled kindly as story and lesson

thick clouds that seldom visit any more.

“While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till

it be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it.”

~  Samuel Johnson

Challenging the Rabbit in the Sky

Just because I said the theme this month was on humour,

I didn’t mean that it was all going to be humourous.

I’ll start with a wee bit of a rant

A rant about the tired old line ‘It’s just a joke.’

A joke - a tease - ‘I didn’t really mean it.’

Something meant as a joke

someone else finds offensive

or maybe hurtful and

any humour is lost.

Jokes are supposed to evoke

laughter

guffaws

smiles

If instead what is evoked is 

offensive silence by either or both party

sharp defensive words

feelings of ridicule and hurt.

Any humour is lost.

On the flip side,

if everything heard, 

feels like a sharp jab to the heart,

is that heart already wounded and sore?

And is it a deep, private hurt?

Learning to discern rabbits in the sky at sunset 

instead of pending rain and stormy weather is a challenge.

Learning to share jokes and joys sensitively ~ also a challenge.

Communicating the differences in perception, without rancor, another challenge.

“Life is a tragedy for those who feel, 

and a comedy for those who think.”

~ Jean de La Bruyere

Humour - A Theme for April, 2023

‘Write what you know’ - one of the first rules of writing. 

Some would say this topic isn’t for me without a lot of research. 

Early morning decisions throw down risky challenges.  

Wikipedia, very accessible at 5:45 a.m., an aid and comfort in a time of need, did offer very a very serious definition:

‘The tendency of particular cognitive experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement. The term derives from the humoral medicine of the ancient Greeks, which taught that the balance of fluids in the human body, known as humors (Latin: humor, ‘body fluid’), control human health and emotion.”

Writing put away,

work day to the fore, 

certainty that thirty days about humour would be a piece of cake,

I carried on to my breakfast first!

Humour was on my mind all day.

I went about my work with my ears tuned to sound. 

Laughter! 

What made them laugh? 

What kind of laughter - 

joyful laughter, 

derisive laughter, and 

chuckles about silliness.  

(I’m sure there were more types of laughter.)

But what was so funny? (I seemed to be saying that all day!)

Hearing about a ‘good sense of humour’ - a pretty common phrase - I wanted to ask the meaning, but rushed off to complete my duties. 

I really am not sure I know what that phrase means, even though I’ve used it myself many times.

What I do know about humour is that it is an unspoken bridge that can be crossed in any situation - whether of sadness, joy or any deep emotion. Gentle humour seems unerringly to find the chink in armour thick and unyielding.

So this month should be interesting - and who knows - it may wind up being a very short ‘theme’ month!

“There’s nothing like a gleam of humor to reassure you that 

a fellow human being is ticking inside a strange face.”

~ Eva Hoffman