You will probably be amused to know that in researching for this book I have spent over a week slaving over my computer and various books all in the quest of some simple answers to this question: ‘What’s the easy way to write poetry?’

The short answer is, ‘there isn’t one’. Not because writing poetry has to be difficult and complex, but simply because, it turns out, poetry today can be pretty much anything you like from a perfectly crafted Shakespearean sonnet to three lines all consisting of identical words.

In short, poetry is words with rhythm however you like ‘em. They don’t even have to rhyme.

As I see it (but I’m no poet, believe me) the art of poetry lies in its ‘marriage’ (sorry!) between pleasing sound patterns created by the words, and a distinct message created by the thinking behind the words. This is what makes it such an attractive element of a wedding speech.

YOU CAN WRITE AN ORIGINAL POEM

If you want to use some poetry in your speech forget trying to compete with Wordsworth or Keats; if you want to quote poetry of that type and standard then just help yourself to it. Unless you just so happen to be an accomplished poet yourself, an original poem of your own will be much more effective is it’s kept simple and uncomplicated.

Let’s see, without becoming intellectually stressed, how to put some simple poetry together that will contribute cleverly to your wedding speech.

A very brief word about technicalities

As I said, poems these days don’t even need to rhyme. However, if they’re going to work they need to adhere to some sort of rhythm pattern. And if you’re a bit of a traditionalist like me you will probably prefer to make the odd few lines, at least, rhyme in that old-fashioned way.

I won’t even go near the proper technical terms of poetry here, but if you want to learn more about them I have included some references in the resources section at the back of this book. Here, though, are some very basic tips to bear in mind.

Pick a rhythm for your poem and try to stick to it as closely as possible

Define this to yourself by using the sounds ‘de DUM de DUM,’
etc. So the first stanza of a simple poem would be worked out like
this:

Some	mot	or	ists	are	ve	ry	kind
de	DUM	de	DUM	de	DUM	de	DUM
To	hors	es	some	what	heat	ed
de	DUM	de	DUM	de	de	de
You	slow	and	stop,	with	eng	ines	off,
de	DUM	de	DUM	de	DUM	de	DUM
So	we	can	re	main	seat	ed.
de	DUM	de	DUM	de	de	de

This gives you the basic rhythmic structure you need to work from.

Decide which lines should rhyme

In the case of the poem above, it’s lines number two and four that rhyme. The way to remember that - and the fact that lines one and three don’t rhyme - is: A - B - C - B.

Probably the form I’ve used here is the easiest, but if you’re feeling ambitious you can use pretty well any combination of rhyming scheme you like. Another common form is A – B – A – B, which means that rhymes occur with lines one and three and lines two and four. You could also choose A – A – B – B, etc.

Think of a theme, an idea, a story

As we know, poems are a combination of nice sounding, rhythmic words with a message. It’s very easy for the inexperienced poet to get that balance wrong and tend to focus more on the rhythm and rhyme of the words themselves than on what they’re actuallysaying.

So think of what you want your poem tosay. It could be about:

• this wedding day
• your own marriage
• your relationship with the bride and/or groom
• your views on love
• your love for your children.

As always, some tasteful humour works well here and you may want to introduce some into your poem. This does not have to run wall-to-wall; there is no reason why some verses of your poem can’t be serious while others are funny.

Make a list of useful rhyming words

Think of some key words to express your theme or story, then list as many words as you can think of that rhyme with them. Don’t forget words that begin with more than one consonant, that are multi-syllabic, etc. Let’s say you want to write an amusing short poem about your grandson, the bridegroom, whose name is Will. Here’s the list of words you might put down.

Will	love	Gran	groom
bill	above	Nan	boom
fill	dove	man	loom
hill	glove	ban	broom
mill	’guv’	can	room
until	of	fan	bedroom

… and so-on. You may not use all or even any of these, but it helps to give you some guidelines. Also check out Resources, pages 205-6 for rhyming dictionaries and similar online resources.

Decide how many verses you want and allocate a ‘task’ to each one

In other words, you should try to plan your poem out as far as you can. Bearing in mind that you may be a little restrained by finding words that fit in with the rhythm and rhyme with each other, you may want to allow yourself to be a bit flexible here.

So your poem plan for this same example might be

• Stanza 1: Will when he was little.
• Stanza 2: Will growing up.
• Stanza 3: Will as a soldier in the Army.
• Stanza 4: Will as a married man.

And off you go start writing!

To give you a little something to help get the creative flow going, here is a poem I wrote one day after a ride on my horse when the horse had been frightened by the loud noise of the air brakes letting off from a lorry which had kindly stopped to let us go by safely. Lorry drivers, nice though their intentions are, don’t seem to realise that once the horse is adjacent to the back of the lorry it’s right by those noisy brakes. And horses hate hissing noises. (Excerpted from myThe Horse Lover’s Joke Book, Kenilworth Press, 2001.)

Jo Parfitt, a great friend and colleague of mine wrote a poem for her own wedding speech and has shared her personal tips with us here.

Scanning is important. Always tum-te-tum it out to see if it scans nicely. Look for patterns in the rhymes either at the ends of lines or within lines. For example:

I’d always poo-pooed the idea that once wooed

Or

It’s rare that an ungainly goose
Can trap a man without a noose

I like to have different patterns that may seem random but work fine when read aloud.

With my poem, the rhyme scheme evolved to match the words which ran something like this

Note the word ordinary I pronounced this oR-diN-air-Y to make it fit the scan scheme better.

My advice is go for laughs. Remember it is to be read aloud, so keep it short and snappy. Use puns and plays on words. However avoid cheap rhymes and sentence constructions like:

I’ve known Jonathan for many a year
and his snoring is terrible I do hear

Short lines and frequent rhymes work better:

I’ve known that for ages
Jon’s kept rats in cages

Jo Parfitt, The Book Cook,

www.summertimepublishing.com

LIMERICKS: AN EXCELLENT CHOICE FOR WEDDINGS

Limericks are all-time favourites for light-hearted, happy occasions and are surprisingly easy to write. Because of their well-known structure and strong connections with the naughty world of adult humour audiences will tend to assume a limerick is going to be funny as soon as you start reading or reciting it.

Also, limericks only have to be vaguely connected with the person or occasion at which they are performed, and in some ways the more outrageous and/or silly they are the more the audience will appreciate them.

The rhythm of a limerick is always basically the same, although you can add little twiddles to it such as those I have included in brackets:

• 1.De DUM de de DUM de de DUM (de)
• 2.De DUM de de DUM de de DUM (de)
• 3.De de DUM de de DUM (de)
• 4.De de DUM de de DUM (de)
• 5.De DUM de de DUM de de DUM (de)

And the rhyming scheme of a limerick is always the same, too; lines one, two and five rhyme with each other, and lines three and four rhyme with each other. So, for the record, the pattern goes A-A-B-B-A.

The trick when writing limericks is to pick line-end words that offer you lots of rhyming options. The other day a friend was going to a birthday party where every guest had to get up and perform a limerick about the birthday boy, a lawyer whose name was a very useful ‘Tim.’ This is what I wrote for my friend to say:

There was a smart lawyer called Tim
Who never quite learned how to swim
But a plaintiff from hell
Threw him into a well
Now Tim’s back-stroke’s superbly in trim.

I think my job would have been harder if the lawyer’s name had been, say, Marcus or Boris!

As with other types of poetry it’s a great help if you decide on your theme - which is nearly always expressed in the first line of the limerick - and then list as many words that rhyme with the line-end word of your choice. This gives you a range to choose from for lines one, two and five. In the case of Tim, here, I wrote down the following:

Tim, dim, him, Jim, gym, Kim, limb,
rim, vim, whim, slim, swim, trim

I liked the idea of ‘swim’ so it wasn’t hard to come up with the idea for lines three and four. And the last line needs a bit of punch, and/or to create a surprise - it’s like the punchline of a joke.

ADAPTING EXISTING POETIC MATERIAL

If you don’t want to write your own poem from scratch, you could consider adapting some well known material for the purposes of your wedding speech.

This does not necessarily have to be a poem; it can be the words of a song, a hymn, or even a prayer. And any lawyers reading this book please calm down. I honestly don’t think anyone would ever complain about someone reciting the words to a copyrighted piece at a private event like a wedding. In any case a great deal of popular, well known poems, songs and hymns are either out of copyright or not subject to copyright laws anyway.

Let’s be naughty for a moment then and look at how we could use some of that old Cahn/Van Heusen song made famous by Frank Sinatra, calledLove and Marriage.

Original:

Love and marriage, love and marriage
Go together like a horse and carriage
This I tell you brother
You can’t have one, you can’t have one, you can’t have one without
the other

Now - in your role as sister or mother of the bridegroom, whose name is Simon:

Your potential adaptation:

Love and marriage, love and marriage
Go together like a horse and carriage
This I tell you, Simon
So you beware, you’ll get nowhere, unless you really put the time in!

REWRITTEN NURSERY RHYMES

Another type of poem/song you might like to adapt is the nursery rhyme. Here are some examples from two of my joke books, to give you a flavour of how these can work.

Little Miss Whippet
Was no more than a snippet
Sniffing the curds and whey
When along came a spider
Started eating beside her

‘I’ll teach him,’ she thought, ‘right away.’
So little Miss Whippet
Despite being a snippet
Stood up and started to squeal
The spider was shock-ed
Took off like a rocket
And Miss Whippet partook of the meal.
(Excerpted fromCanine Capers, Kenilworth Press, 2002)

Little Miss Maddle
Sat in the saddle
Eating her Burger King

When came a bike rider
That revved up beside her
And her horse began fast galloping
Poor Little Miss Maddle
Fell out of the saddle
Straight on to her safety hat
Still clutching her burger
Her shouts threatened murder
‘Now I can’t have my french fries with that!’
(Excerpted fromThe Horse Lover’s Joke Book, Kenilworth Press,
2001)

Jack and Jill went up the hill
To fetch their dog some water
But when they returned the dog was concerned
With guzzling their nice bread and bawt-ter.
(Excerpted fromCanine Capers, Kenilworth Press, 2002)

Jack and Jill went up the hill
To try to jump the water
Jack made a hash and fell with a splash
But Jill jumped clear as one oughta.
(Excerpted fromThe Horse Lover’s Joke Book, Kenilworth Press,
2001)

Mary had a little pup
Its teeth were sharp as razors
And everywhere that Mary went
It tore things up to blazes.
(Excerpted fromCanine Capers, Kenilworth Press, 2002)

Mary had a little horse
Which kicked like there’s no tomorrow
And everywhere that Mary went
No other horse dared follow
(Excerpted fromThe Horse Lover’s Joke Book, Kenilworth Press,
2001)

Mary Mary quite contrary
How was obedience class?
Sit and stay went quite well but his ‘walkies’ were hell
Barbara Woodhouse, your methods were crass.
(Excerpted fromCanine Capers, Kenilworth Press, 2002)

Mary Mary quite contrary
How did the dressage test go?
Counter-canter went well but my half-pass was hell
So in all it was quite a poor show.
(Excerpted fromThe Horse Lover’s Joke Book, Kenilworth Press
2001)

Little Bo-Peep has lost her sheep
And she’s no idea where to find them
The sheepdog got wind of a bitch and some sin
So ran off and left her to mind them
(Excerpted fromCanine Capers, Kenilworth Press, 2002)

Little Bo-Porse got bucked off her horse
And she’s no idea where to find him
Leave him alone, he’ll make his way home
Trailing his reins behind him
(Excerpted fromThe Horse Lover’s Joke Book, Kenilworth Press,
2001)

Happy poetry writing!