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Messy Desk

Over the years I have found myself writing some rather goofy poetry… just for fun. A few of my silly poems have been published in anthologies, but mostly I just do them for my own enjoyment. Here is one I hope you enjoy.

From the deepest, darkest corner of my sticky, messy desk
came a gruesome, grumbly rumble that was truly quite grotesque.
It startled all my classmates… made the teacher stop and stare.
As for me, I gasped and gurgled, as I pushed back on my chair.
Then the desk began to tremble and we shivered in our shoes
as we watched a drippy, slimy, green and gory kind of ooze
start to come out from the corners, from the front and from the side.
There was screaming, there was yelling, and the teacher went bug-eyed.
“Let’s calm down,” I quickly muttered.  “There’s no reason to distress.
I am sure whatever’s in there has resulted from the mess.
I think maybe if I clear out all the junk and crud and goo,
then perhaps the grumbly rumble will come out and go home too.”
So I quickly grabbed the garbage and began to scoop and dump,
when a strange and ugly something tumbled out with a Ka-Thump!
Then the fuzzy, moldy critter scurried off with quite a ZING,
and my classmates and my teacher cried, “What was that awful thing!?”
“Well, last Tuesday for my sandwich I had liverwurst on rye,
so I stuffed the awful thing into my desk… I cannot lie.
Guess it molded and mutated, sprouting legs, a mouth and eyes…
grew too big, then started moving, giving us today’s surprise.”
Teacher hollered, “How disgusting!” Scrub your desk and clean the floor.”
And my classmates glared and grumbled as they watched me do my chore.
There’s a lesson to this nightmare that I’ve learned, I must confess…
Don’t forget to eat your sandwich… and don’t leave your desk a mess!

Author’s Helpers

Many times you hear authors say that writing is a “lonely” job, because we do most of our writing alone. Well, that can be something that’s hard about being an author.  But I almost ALWAYS have company when I write—no matter where I write! (I just wish they were better at typing!)

So Why a Turkey?

People are always asking me— why did you choose Turkey as a character?

I admit, I never thought turkeys had much personality— that is until I lived with one. When I was 21 I lived for a year and a half in Peru. Part of that time I lived with a family high in the Andes Mountains. After finishing our meals we would all scrape any leftovers into a trough in the courtyard of the house for the pets. The dogs would come running— and so would the turkey. They called him “Pavito” (which means “little turkey”) and he thought of himself as one of the dogs. He would sometimes follow me around and tease me. I learned turkeys can have as much personality as any other animal. That’s why he became the star of my Turkey Trouble books!

Why Turkey?