ManicDDaily

Photo by Izy Gruye

Orange Who?

And a knock knock–orange you glad I didn’t
say banana? Which seemed uproarious
to me as young child, packed full of hidden
punch as in you wanna whole mess of
Hawaiian—which poured out neon red
as dye number four–a liquid lipstick
we could sip and smack, our grimaces ad
libbed ad infinitum, all puns our thick
intoxicants–going down so slow
first go, but then, in repeated flares,
fire krispies that snapped, crackled, popped, oh–
pop! pop! as in Hop On, as in where’s
the beef, Waldo, fee fie fofana talk—
(Orange you glad I didn’t say–knock knock?)

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A reading of the poem:

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Here’s a kind of silly (sort of) sonnet for dVerse Poets Poetics hosted by Kelvin S.M., and inspired by his lovely orange painting, and also for Real Toads, fourteen line poem prompt hosted by Kerry O’Connor, and inspired by Izy Gruye’s child photograph!  (A lot of inspiring visuals here!)  Thanks to Kelvin and Izy and Kerry. 

Some quick process notes for those who did not grow up in my time frame in the U.S. — “Orange You Glad I didn’t Say Banana” was the last line to a very old (and one of my first) knock knock jokes (which involved answering banana to the first several knock knocks.) 

“Do you want a Hawaiian punch” was another pun in an old commercial for a fruit drink.  Red Number 4 was a very commonly used bright red dye.

Hop on Pop is a book by Dr. Seuss.  Where’s Waldo? a series of popular books, Banana fana fofana -was a refrain from a famous song called The Name Game.