Blessed are the Peacemakers

[Zorro]

A quarrelsome race are humans,
Poets the worst of the lot.
If it were ever made legal,
Some would have others shot

The scene is just like a playground,
With feuds, name-calling and dudgeon,
Bullies and victims and brooding
in dark corners, 'specially 'bout judgin'.

It needs a poetic ACAS.
Or UN. No, that would be worse.
Put a stop to all these handbags
Giving rulings in blank verse.

feels like it needs another verse, but I'm stuck. Can anyone help?

[Tim Love]

Stanza 1 line 4's a bit weak, and stanza 2's rather thin on content. The plot's ok until the last two lines - they don't add much. But I don't know how to replace those lines with something humourously thoughtful. I think what I'd first do with the poem is mark the stresses and look at the rhythm. I'd also try to remove the diction change of "'specially 'bout judgin'".

For what it's worth, I don't find the poetry scene any worse in this regard than politics, opera, football, hospitals, art, univ departments, etc., so I'm reading your piece ironically.

[Arian]

Personally, I think you should leave it as just s1 - a sort of ogden nashish, semi-epigrammatic comment on Life, the Universe & Everything. For example:

ogden nash.JPG (21.29 KiB) Viewed 1392 times

[Macavity]

Yes, perhaps stick to 4 lines for impact rather than dilute with more lines.

mac

[John G]

i cant read this without hearing this..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xLUEMj6cwA

and agree with Arian, works better with just the first stanza - short and to the point.

sorry i cant offer more.