Dingbats and Doggerel

ABC Wednesday
February 4th, 2015

The letter for the week is D
The subject is Dingbats and Doggerel

Starting with the Doggerel I go to visit with my old friend, Ogden Nash, who has huddled on my book shelves for nigh  on to seventy years, entertaining me on many occasions with his humorous verse, - his elegant doggerel.  (Doggerel - light verse, usually of irregular metre, often dealing with nonsensical subjects, and looked down upon by many litur guru' ists  -  not connected with the church but a doggerel word for literary critics)

Here is an example from Nash's 'Good Intentions" which seems especially relevant on these gloomy sunless February days.

Here We Go Quietly Nuts in May

Do you hanker for April showers,

Or a rarefied day in June?

Give me a grade-A May day,

And please deliver it soon.

I am weary of branches naked,

Creaking like lovelorn cats;

The earth underfoot half baked 

And the sun overhead ersatz.

Send me a balmy zephyr

To play me a rigadoon,

And I'll gulp of my grade-A May day

Till my hiccups hammer the moon.

And another little brief verse about the Porpoise

I kind of like the playful porpoise,

A healthy mind in a healthy corpus.

He and his cousin, the playful dolphin,

Why they like swimmin like I like golphin.

As to Dingbats, well, probably the most well-known is Edith,  in Archie Bunker, but Dingbats also refers to a type of font similar to Wingdings that provides the writer with all sorts of signs, symbols and graphics.

And to a 'Paul Sellars'  word game popular in the United Kingdom and in North America, where it is known as Whatzit.

Dingbats are 'cunningly disquised names, phrases and sayings that are turned around, upside-down, sideways or jumbled up.  You need to work out the hidden word or phrase on each card.  It could be the size, position or direction that will give you a clue.  Sometimes the pictures combined with a word or a number will give you your answer'  (thanks to Mr. Google)      .

Examples   -  ALL world.         (it's a small world after all)

                    Q ♂♂♂E2  (three men in a boat)

                    Mail       Male        (postman)
Sounds like a most entertaining way to exercise the brain.

For more Ds drop in at ABC Wednesday, here, - with many thanks to Roger, Denise and all Dependable helpers.