Bella

Have you ever stopped to wonder
What Bella does each day?
She doesn’t only nap and groom –
She ventures out to play.

She plays that she’s a pirate cat
Upon the stormy seas;
When she encounters crews of mice
She captures all their cheese.

She’s voyaged to the ocean floor
To catch a tasty dish;
Instead she played some hide and seek
With crabs and cuttlefish.

By rocketship she’s been to space
And swam among the stars;
She’s been across the Milky Way,
She found there’s life on Mars.

She’s starred up on the silver screen
In Technicolor shows;
You’ll find her paws in Hollywood
By Marilyn Monroe’s.

She’s entered poker tournaments
And put her chips all in;
Whatever cards that she was dealt
She bluffed her way to win.

She plays the drums and lead guitar
In her band “Tortoise Hell”;
When on her European tour
She played the Swiss cowbell.

Around the world in eighty days
In a hot air balloon;
She spent at least two thirds of them
Just singing to the moon.

But every day when you return
You’ll find her waiting there;
It’s where she likes it most of all –
At home, within your care.

Big Time Charlie

What never existed has now gone –
Just a figment of pure imagination;
Like a Willy Wonka chocolate bar,
An exotic, ethereal confection.

See I wasn’t Charlie Bucket with a Golden Ticket:
I was Augustus Gloop swimming in the soup,
Violet Beauregarde chewing gum too hard,
Veruca Salt in the bad nut vault,
Mike Teavee, about the size of a flea.

When the Oompa-Loompas sang at last,
The Great Glass Elevator didn’t ascend;
No it plunged straight down, direct to hell,
So its occupant could finally comprehend.

With glittering eyes you can search for magic
But what first seems sweet can end up tragic.

Okanagan Odyssey: Chapter Six

The five-strong party soon regrouped
Their questing spirits hadn’t drooped
The angel’s words had warmed their souls
Just like an engine fueled with coals.

Although they might not share her creed
They’d call on her in times of need,
To combat forces of despair,
Despondency must best beware.

Bus as for now they had to plot
A course towards their Camelot,
For only there would they then find
The quest that brought their stars aligned.

They’d heard it said it lay due north
So on that heading they set forth;
Yet hadn’t even hit their stride
When desert stretched horizon-wide.

They stopped a while to have a think
(And also have a little drink),
Outside a tavern thought a myth:
The Adega on 45th.

While pondering, something quite bizarre
Passed quickly by – a yellow car!
They watched it speed off ‘cross the land,
It vanished like a grain of sand.

“Hey, yellow car!” Ser Salmon yelled
Transfixed by what he had beheld;
“We can afford to go explore
If we’ve a car or 4×4.”

Such transportation there was not
Yet somehow they had near forgot:
The camel camels by the tree,
Just perfect for this territory.

To cross the arid, desolate waste
Could not be done by day in haste,
So when dusk fell they took their steeds
To brave the dust and tumbleweeds.

While navigating overnight
“La Stella” was their guiding light,
Their polestar leading them towards
Their epic win, their great rewards.

As dawn approached they made their camp
Before the sun could blaze its stamp;
They slept all day until it set,
Then mosied on without its threat.

This pattern carried on for days
From waning light to morning haze;
The desert’s kingdom seemed immense,
The end of it they could not sense.

Yet end it did when on a ridge
They spied below a rainbow bridge;
There guarding it was Whiskey Jack,
A gruesome golem, marble black.

Now Mister Jack was quite the brute,
Misconduct, mayhem, his strong suit;
But snores told them the golem slept,
So cross the bridge the party crept.

And lo, what do you think they found
When once again on solid ground?
Yes after they had been to roam
Their path had led them all back home.

The Jam

Oh come now friends, new countrymen,
Lend ears to my preamble,
Concerning sylvan fugitives
That lurk within the bramble.

**Spoiler alert** for those that care,
This account is rather short;
The gang weren’t on the run for long,
In fall they all were caught.

They got jammed up at their last job,
Their bodies black and blue;
No razzmatazz, no last hurrah,
This berry band were through.

Now you can whine, you may want more,
But that’s the story told;
The forest fruits are now in jars
Worth twice their weight in gold.

Stranger than Fiction

“Little did he know” is our beginning
With the introduction of Harold Crick;
When he hears a voice, his day narrating,
He wonders – is he a schizophrenic?
Oh Harold isn’t mad, certainly not,
But his life is much stranger than fiction;
He stars in a book, his routine its plot
Where his death is soon planned to be written.
Avoiding their fate’s what most would attempt
But dear Harold saw no use pretending;
He couldn’t cheat death, he wasn’t exempt-
He saw beauty accepting his ending.
“Little did he know” is where we began;
Once he did, he showed, how to die a man.

Pot Pourriddle #1

I’m not a button but am pressed,
Raise your heart rate when at rest;
I drip so you don’t drop,
Stimulate so you don’t stop;
I’m not beer but can be brewed,
Dark as night when in the nude;
Make me heavier I get lighter,
Through a filter life gets brighter,
I am ready in an instant
But take longer under pressure.
What am I?

The Flavour Thesaurus

Around the flavour wheel we go
In search of inspiration;
Where we will stop we don’t yet know
Or what’s our next creation.

Past cheesy, earthy, mustardy,
And past sulfurous too;
Our finger comes to rest upon
A segment coloured blue

“Marine” is where our finger’s stopped,
It’s where you find the fish;
The oily, white and shelly kinds-
We’ll put some in our dish.

Another flavour’s needed now
To pair with fishy friends;
Around the wheel we go again
To see what fortune sends.

The second time our finger stops,
“Fresh fruity”‘s where it lands;
So that then means it’s… fish with fruit?
Oh well, if fate demands.

Although it seems that we’ve struck out,
The truth is that we’ve not;
There are two classics pairing them
You may quite like a lot.

The first combines flat fish with grapes,
It’s really quite unique;
In France it’s held in high regard,
It’s called “sole Veronique”.

You’ll recognise the second match,
It’s shellfish and tomato;
A salty Bloody Mary base
That you folks call “clamato”.

So give the wheel a spin yourself
To seek out something new;
If fish with fruit can work out well
Then what else may do too?

Stages: VI

I am a fish
A wish
An uneaten dish
You lured in but chose to let go;
Angling for sport
Line caught
Unwelcome in port
Your appetite hopeless to know.

Okanagan Odyssey: Chapter Five

When Tabbyshell did loudly sing
Of grievous hunger, yodelling,
They thought that waiting would be rude
So set right off in search of food.

Retracing steps they sought escape
Until they crossed a mighty ape;
Although their fortunes looked quite grim
The Tabbyshell took care of him.

Relieved, they ambled on again
(The monkey wouldn’t bring them pain),
But came upon a noxious smell
That left them feeling quite unwell.

Beside the bog at Upper Bench
Enclosed in its eternal stench
Their stomachs retched at scent so foul
They almost there threw in the towel.

Then making haste to cleaner airs
They shadowed passing spirit bears
Who knew their way out from the maze
So that the friends weren’t stuck for days.

When out the labyrinth they came
Much gladness did they all proclaim;
The air was free, the sky was clear,
It filled their hearts with fullsome cheer.

Alas, that didn’t last too long
(Inevitably things went wrong);
When taking lunch at Township 7
They thought they’d died and gone to heaven.

For from the skies there fluttered down,
With halo hovering o’er its crown,
A gleaming angel, pearly white
Whose countenance was glowing bright.

She brought with her a fount of mirth
As she descended down to Earth;
She also brought with her some booze
She’d stolen from a pleasure cruise.

“Hello, my dears” she broadly slurred
As from her vestments she conjured
A round of drinks to there consume,
Their present need she did assume.

“Upon a quest you all set out
But dear oh dear you’ve come to doubt
The worthiness of what you seek
Forgetting that you’re each unique.”

“What you all do you do so well-
Especially with Tabbyshell;
You should continue, not give up,
Despite your present, brief, hiccup.”

“With lessons learned in heaven’s choir
I’ve flown to you to now inspire;
Inebriation’s not a crime
You must have fun from time to time.”

“I’m here for you when you need me
Just like I am now, drunkenly;
With alcohol I’ll lend a hand
For hardship isn’t ever planned.”

Then from her glass she deeply quaffed,
With beating wings she bore aloft,
She left the group with minds agog,
With wonder at her monologue.

The Pig

Among the gnarled and wizened oaks
Beneath the acorns strewn around
A happy piggy snuffling;
Between the roots it snouts and pokes
In search of treasures underground
The happy piggy’s truffling.