Opossum Poem by Linda Hepner

Opossum Opossa: Third Declension in Algonquin

What's worse, a toothy rat
Or declination pokes?
How punish tit for tat
Pedantary jokes?

Some scream, others run
To find a heavy pot,
Kill the varmint with a stun,
Don't regret its lot.

Some note the story when
They look up from their book;
Where's a man when you need men?
And that is why I took

A heavy pot of boiling oil,
You'd call it overkill,
Because it's worse to let words roil
And sap your nerves and skill.

Who wins the possum race
In the garbage bin?
Ye opossa watch this space:
Grammar did you in.

29th May 2005