Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Into Every Life a Frog Must Fall

I wanted a frog
in my garden,
I wanted his voice,
his splashing around,
when one appeared
I scorned him.


Was it my aversion to
nictitating membranes
slipping over
blinkless eyeballs,
or webby-toed
sticky suctions, his
unforgivable froginess?


There are other things
that look like frogs –
flowers in green paper,
rumpled blankets,
a crumpled letter,
tear-soaked Kleenex
looks like a frog,
his pond-green Peugeot
leaping away.


            Wanda McCollar



11 comments:

  1. This is very good, Wanda. I love the mix of science and anti-science in the second stanza:

    nictitating membranes vs. unforgivable froginess

    And then in the last stanza, things that look like frogs, as it ends with his pond-green Peugeot/ leaping away, our implied image goes right to the fairytale prince in frog's clothing... or frog in prince's clothing, as the case may be.

    Very nicely done. I love it.

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  2. Poor froggy! He only wanted to sing you his love song... I love them!
    Very unique and fun idea for the prompt.

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  3. This is wonderful. So much to be found in a frog!

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  4. Thank you Paul, Cynthia, and Erin for commenting. I wrote this poem in French, worked better - I should not have translated it. Nevertheless, you were kind to comment.

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  5. frogs are wonderful....my oldest grandaughter loves frogs...and snakes..and....anyways thanks for sharing this....happy hollidays to you

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  6. Thanks for sharing your bit of aversion therapy! Although the union-hood of brother frogs may apply for an exclusionary clause.

    And a delightful final leap, "his pond-green Peugeot leaping away." Suspect you just might win at the Calaveras County Fair and Jumping Frog Jubilee. Thanks Wanda!

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  7. I'd say it works just fine in English. Especially the pond-green Peugeot. And unforgivible frogginess. Sorry your lord lept, but better to have frogged and lost...

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  8. This is wonderful from beginning to end, but it's that pond green Peugeot that provided the perfect ending!

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  9. Superb piece of work - frogginess descriptives are perfect and the Peugeot is a well-tuned tickle of reality.

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  10. I like the shift in tone between the stanzas; it heightens the effects, first the simple and direct then the objective and finally the metaphoric and felt, disproving poetically the seeming limitations of the froggy "truth" about frogs.

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  11. I see the human mind reasoning throughout this poem: first, the desire for the frog, next the repulsion once it is actually there, and then the mention of frog-like things that are not froggy at all. I like this. I also like your Peugeot metaphor at the end. Nicely done.

    -Nicole

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