
Past Times
When I was young, I used to watch
my fox terrier chasing his tail,
running round and round in circles,
never quite catching it,
but never giving up his high hopes
of catching that little rag-tag of a bobtail
that dangles there behind.
Round about and out and in and out
all day that silly dog did spin,
spinning in prose and then in rhyme,
until I lost all track of time.
Comment: I loved a part of one of my prompts, so I turned it into a personal poem. The second stanza is based on a poem by Thackeray. I learned it in my youth. Learning poetry and remembering it, another past time from past times. I also love playing on words. Imitatio is one of the rhetorical devices used traditionally by poets. To imitate, is to express one’s admiration of another person’s work. It should not be confused with plagiary / plagiarism, which is something entirely different. Anyone who has followed my writing, on this blog and elsewhere, will know that I echo the words of other poets and that I do so deliberately, to praise them and acknowledge their creativity and their continuing influence upon my own poetic world.
Today’s Cartoon – A Time Apart – by my friend Moo who is very generous with his art..