Hey Diddle Diddle – the Real Story

Yes, the dish ran away with the spoon,
but Mother Goose got it wrong.
She laid an egg with this one.
It was not a happily-ever-after tale.

Turns out the dish was a cad.
A saucer with sterling designs,
and always a cups man.

Young utensil that she was,
she never guessed his real intention
to tarnish her reputation.

He led her past the infamous cow
the one who jumped over the moon.
Romancing her under cover of night,
surely, he thought, she’d swoon.

But alas, there were too many stars that night,
revealing what he truly was really made of.
Just cheap melamine, not Royal Doulton or Spode.

Avoiding every advance he dished out,
she ran back to the cat and the fiddle.
She maintained her sterling reputation,
after all,
she was always a respectable ladle!


Written for dVerse, the virtual pub for poets around the globe where today is Open Link Night and poets may post any one poem of their choosing.

This little diddle is an edited version of NaPoWriMo’s day 22 prompt: “to write a poem in which two things have a fight. Two very unlikely things, if you can manage it. Like, maybe a comb and a spatula. Or a daffodil and a bag of potato chips. Or perhaps your two things could be linked somehow – like a rock and a hard place – and be utterly sick of being so joined. The possibilities are endless!”

For those of you not familiar with this Mother Goose nursery rhyme, it goes like this:
Hey, diddle, diddle,
The cat and the fiddle,
The cow jumped over the moon;
The little dog laughed
To see such sport,
And the dish ran away with the spoon.

Image is from Bing Create.

A Silly Tale

Mr. and Mrs. Tabby Cat
sat down to have a very long chat.
They’d just returned from quite a sail
that really produced quite a tale.

They bravely decided to set afloat
in what they thought was a sturdy boat.
They left at night under a harvest moon
only to be met by a horrific typhoon.

The seas roiled and got very rough,
they soon decided they’d had enough.
Now back home, they sat in a puddle
whiskers rattled, feelings a muddle.

Boots came off, dropped with a plop.
“What can we do so our spirits don’t flop?”
“I’ll bake a pie,” said Mrs. Cat. “We’ll savor its scent
then eat, until we’re quite content.”

Tummies full, their dreams so sweet
and now this prompt is finally complete!

Image created in Bing Create.

This was quite a prompt for day 13 at NaPoWriMo! Yes, April is National Poetry Writing Month and the challenge is to write a poem every day.

Today’s involved prompt: create a word list that includes 5 words related to the senses, two concrete nouns, and two verbs. Then come up with a rhyming word for each of those 7 words! See my list below. And then, of course, write a poem using all those words, trying to include the rhyme in the poem! It’s what I call a sudoku prompt!

5 sense words chosen with they rhyming word
sweet : complete         for taste
scent : content             something you smell
rough : enough           for touch
plop : flop                   a sound you can hear
puddle : muddle         something you can see

Two concrete nouns and their rhyming words
cat : chat
moon: typhoon

Two verbs and their rhyming word
sail : tale
float : boat