Chapter Three: An Important Lesson in Poetry

If you recall, Pete the Barncat had composed a silly little poem. Do I dare repeat it? I guess it wouldn’t hurt.

“We tingle as we mingle, but I don’t care/’Cause Wonderdog Hankie lost his underwear.”

See? I told you it was silly, but Drover burst out with a giggle. “Tee hee. Oh, that’s a good one, Pete.”

I marched over to the cat and gave him a snarl. “Okay, kitty, this has gone far enough. At this point, I have two words for you.”

“Happy birthday?”

“No.”

“Merry Christmas?”

“No.”

“Great poem?”

“No. My two words to you are . . . shove off, get lost, and beat it!”

The cat fluttered his eyelids. “But Hankie, that’s seven words. Maybe you miscounted.”

“Oh, yeah? Then let me explain.” I stuck my nose in his face and said, “ROOF!”

Heh heh. That got him. You should have seen the little pest. My Air Horns Bark blasted his ears off and sent him rolling backwards, hissing and spitting.

I love doing that. See, you have to be firm with these cats. When they start mouthing off, you don’t argue with ’em or try to be reasonable. You give ’em Air Horns right in the face. That will settle most arguments with a cat. And it’s great fun too.

Well, that took care of my business with the cat, so I marched back to my assistant. “Okay, where were we?”

“Well, let me see. I think you were talking about . . . poetry.”

“Ah, yes. Poetry.” I began pacing back and forth in front of him. “It’s a very important subject, Drover, because we dogs take pride in our ability to compose verses. Cats try to cobble up a poem every now and then, but the result is always embarrassing.”

“I thought it was pretty good.”

“They have no talent for language.”

“I liked the part about your underwear.”

“They have no sense of meter or rhyme.”

“I thought it was funny as heck.”

I stopped pacing. “What?”

Drover glanced around. “I didn’t say anything.”

“I thought I heard a voice.”

“I’ll be derned. It wasn’t me.”

I looked up into a tree nearby. “Hmmm. It must have been a bird.” I resumed pacing. “Dogs, on the other hand, seem to have a natural skill for composing delightful poems, and to demonstrate this, you give me a word and I’ll make up a poem about it.”

“Any word?”

“Any word at all. Give me your best shot.”

“Well, let’s see. ‘Bulldozer.’”

I pitched that one back and forth in my mind. “Tell you what, let’s try another one.”

“‘Pork rinds.’”

“That’s two words, Drover. Try to play by the rules.”

“Sorry. ‘Leprosy.’”

I stopped in my tracks. “‘Leprosy’! Who can make a rhyme with ‘leprosy’?”

“Well, it’s a word.”

“It’s not a word, it’s a disease. Diseases don’t count in this contest. Give me a normal, healthy American word.”

He frowned. “Darn. Okay, here’s one. ‘Chrysanthemum.’”

“That’s not an American word, it’s Chinese.”

He gave me a devilish grin. “Yeah, and I’ll bet you can’t write a poem about it.”

I marched a few steps away and gazed off into the distance. Drover had challenged my gifts as a poet. Was I dog enough to accept the challenge, or would I wilt under the terrible stress of composing verses about chrysanthemums? This would likely be the most difficult poetic venture I had ever attempted, and the odds against success were astrometrical.

But my pride and reputation were at stake. I strode back to him and prepared to wipe that little smirk off his mouth. “All right, son, I accept your challenge.”

He was stunned. I mean, when his eyes came up, they looked like two big moons with a fly in the center of each. “No fooling? You’re going to do a poem about chrysanthemums?”

“Not just a poem, Drover. I’m going to raise the bar and make it even more difficult. I’m going to compose an entire song about chrysanthemums. It’s never been done before. Nobody has even dared to attempt it.”

“Oh my gosh!”

And with Drover watching in stunned silence, I wrote, composed, arranged, and performed this song, surely one of the most spectacular of my entire career.

The Impossible Chrysanthemum Song

Chrysanthemum flowers are round like a ball.

They grow in the summer and bloom in the fall.

Sometimes they’re yellow and sometimes they’re not.

Chrysanthemums usually live in a pot.

If I were a flower, I’d want to announce

That I had a name normal folks could pronounce.

“Chrysos’” means gold if you happen to speak

That musty old language that came from the Greeks.

Chrysanthemum, chrysanthemum,

A word you can’t say while you’re chew-ing your gum.

This flower is pretty and pleasant to smell,

But, man, it is really a booger to spell.

If I took a notion to send a bouquet,

I’d pick out a flower whose name I could say.

See, what would you write, if you added a card?

“Herewith a flower, the name is too hard

To pronounce.”

I think that chrysanthemums surely must be

The loneliest flowers you ever will see.

Why, even the insects avoid ’em too.

Four-syllable flowers are harder to chew.

Chrysanthemum, chrysanthemum,

A word you can’t say while you’re chew-ing your gum.

This flower is pretty and pleasant to smell,

But, man, it is really a booger to spell.

One more thing ’bout chrysanthemum’s name:

It’s certain to drive all the poets insane.

Try it yourself and give it some time,

But you’ll never invent a chrysanthemum-rhyme.

A song ’bout this flower’s impossible to make.

Shakespeare himself would have gotten the shakes.

Brave poets who tried it are now on the shelf,

But Drover, take note: I’ve done it myself!

Chrysanthemum, chrysanthemum,

A word you can’t say while you’re chew-ing your gum.

This flower is pretty and pleasant to smell,

But, man, it is really a booger to spell.

Pretty awesome song, huh? You bet. Even I was amazed. I turned to Drover and waited for him to burst into applause. He didn’t.

“Hey, I just performed a song about chrysanthemums. Do you suppose you could show some respect?”

“Well, it was pretty good, I guess.”

“Pretty good? Drover, it’s never been done before. This was a first.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t really make a rhyme with chrysanthemum.”

“‘Gum.’ ‘Gum’ rhymes with ‘mum.’”

He grinned. “Yeah, but that’s kind of like cheating. I thought you were going to make a rhyme with the whole word.”

“Drover, there is no word that will rhyme with ‘chrysanthemum,’ and in case you missed it, that was the whole point of the song.”

“Well . . . I liked Pete’s poem better.”

“You . . . what?” I stormed away from the little goof. “Just skip it, Drover. I’m sorry I bothered. Your mind is sick and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Where are we going?”

“Don’t speak to me.”

“Are you looking for Slim?”

“Yes.”

“You’re going in the wrong direction.”

I whirled around and reversed directions. “Don’t tell me what to do, and stop following me. Someone might think we’re friends.”

You see what I have to put up with? The little dunce liked Pete’s pitiful little verse about underwear better than my tribute to . . . oh well.

I found Slim behind the machine shed, scowling at the motor of the old truck. It had been parked there since our last hay-hauling experience, a month ago. The hood was up, and Slim had reached his hand down toward the motor.

I knew what was coming next, and came to a sudden stop. Drover ran into me. “Oops, sorry. Oh look, there’s Slim.”

“Right. Listen, Drover, I’ve got a little job for you.”

His face lit up. “Oh, goodie. You mean we’re friends again?”

“Why yes, of course. That little spat we had about poetry . . . well, in the larger scheme of things, it meant nothing, almost nothing at all.”

“Oh, good. There for a minute, I thought you were mad at me.”

I gave a careless laugh. “Friends argue, Drover, but friendship remains the same.”

“Yeah, like pork rinds.”

“Pork rinds?”

“Yeah, they’re always the same. Greasy. They give me indigestion.”

“Yes, of course.” I leaned toward him and whispered, “Drover, Slim’s having a bad day. I think one of us should rush over to him and . . . you know, cheer him up with Howdys and Happy Looks. Which of us could do that?”

He puzzled over that for a moment, then his face broke into a wide grin. “You know what? I think I could do it.”

“No kidding?”

“Yeah, ’cause I’m in a happy mood, and I know how to do Howdys.”

“With your stub tail?”

“Oh, yeah, I can wiggle it fast. See?” He gave me a demonstration of wiggling his tail. It was pathetic, but I pretended to be impressed.

“That’s perfect, Drover, just what he needs. Okay, pal, rush over there and do your stuff. I’ll be right here, cheering you on.”

“Okay, here I go!”

Heh heh. Do you see what’s coming? You’ll love it.