The other day, in Crossword, I happened to walk in and see this book "Candy is Dandy"... it was a collection of Ogden Nash's verses.. I bought it after just browsing through the content, and what a great buy it was!
After reading the verses, I started looking into more of his work. Brilliant!
Here's something that Anthony Burgess said about his work as an introduction...
"I have never in my life said anything other than laudatory
Of the work of Ogden Nash, whose innovations were chiefly auditory,
Meaning that he brought a new kind of sound to our literary diversions
And didn't care so much about breaking the poetic laws of the Medes and the Persians. "
Some of his verses are so precocious that you just laugh! I'm going to put some down right here... :)
REFLECTION ON ICE-BREAKING
Candy
Is dandy
But liquor
Is quicker.
MORE ABOUT PEOPLE
When people aren't asking questions
They're making suggestions
And when they're not doing one of those
They're either looking over your shoulder or stepping on your toes
And then as if that weren't enough to annoy you
They employ you.
Anybody at leisure
Incurs everybody's displeasure.
It seems to be very irking
To people at work to see other people not working.
So they tell you that work is wonderful medicine,
Just look at Firestone and Ford and Edison,
And they lecture you till they're out of breath or something
And then if you don't succumb they starve you to death or something.
All of which results in a nasty quirk:
That if you don't want to work you have to work to earn enough money so that you won't have to work.
OLD MEN
People expect old men to die,
They do not really mourn old men.
Old men are different. People look
At them with eyes that wonder when...
People watch with unshocked eyes;
But the old men know when an old man dies.
TO A SMALL BOY STANDING ON MY SHOES WHILE I AM WEARING THEM
Let's straighten this out, my little man,
And reach an agreement if we can.
I entered your door as an honored guest.
My shoes are shined and my trousers are pressed,
And I won't stretch out and read you the funnies
And I won't pretend that we're Easter bunnies.
If you must get somebody down on the floor,
What in the hell are your parents for?
I do not like the things that you say
And I hate the games that you want to play.
No mater how frightfully hard you try,
We've little in common, you and I.
The interest I take in my neighbor's nursery
Would have to grow, to be even cursory.
And I would that performing sons and nephews
Were carted away with the daily refuse,
And I hold that frolicsome daughters and nieces
Are ample excuse for breaking leases.
You may take a sock at your daddy's tummy
Or climb all over your doting mummy,
But keep your attentions to me in check,
Or, sonny boy, I will wrong your neck.
A happier man today I'd be,
Had someone wrung it ahead of me.
REFLECTION ON THE FALLIBILITY OF NEMESIS
He who is ridden by a conscience
Worries about a lot of nonscience;
He without benefit of scruples
His fun and income soon quadruples.
