Monday Poetry Stretch - Bing, Bling, Ca-Ching

Time to begin the week with another poetry stretch, and Tricia at The Miss Rumphius Effect suggests a form called a climbing rhyme, where the rhyme moves forward in four-word lines - from fourth position in Line 1, to third in Line 2, to second in Line 3. At that point, the fourth word of Line 3 begins a new rhyme sequence, with the pattern continuing. It feels like a difficult form to end - what do you do with the last line? But here's a possibility:

Heard Over the P.A. System at the Mall

Placido Domingo singing White
Christmas? Not right, not
Bing-ish. Politely tell him:
Time to trim your
repertoire, flim-flam man,
humbugger. You can’t sing
Crosby. Banned. Prohibido, Placido.



Here's an adaptation I like as much, abandoning the third line/fourth word requirement, and going with a simple pattern of 4th/3rd/2nd-word rhymes in separate 3-line stanzas:

Christmas

White, bright bells, tree
tops, kings (three) glistening,
wet sneezes and snow

flakes, listening to Bing
crooning, reindeer singing recorded
carols, blinged baubles wish-

listed, next January banging,
New Year hanging there
syning, langing, aulding away,

longing for more chances,
mustachioed nutcrackers dancing fat
mice, fancy tutu-ing, p.j.'s

on stage– Drosselmeir, Clara,
sugar-plummed fairies, Malled-
out America's symphonic ca-ching.