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A Festival of Double Dactyls

coppola
Follywood-sprawlywood,
Francis Ford Coppola
Found gangster epics a
Lucrative line,

Then came to grief with his
Neo-Conradian
Vietnam acid trip.
Now he makes wine.

Chris O'Carroll


hughes and plath
Loamily-Pomily
Ted Hughes and Sylvia
Found that love’s heaven could
Turn into hell.

Ted went philandering
Mythopoetically;
Sylvia crumpled. Things
Didn’t end well.

George Simmers

zeno
Greekily, freakily,
Zeno of Elea
Reckoned that nothing could
Actually move.

Clearly the theory’s a
Nonsensicality,
Though it’s surprisingly
Hard to disprove.


Rob Stuart


1066
Snippetty-whippetty
Sellar and Yeatman wrote
history’s headlines in
memorable bits

Wrong but Wromantic nails
incontrovertibly
Cavalier mindsets and
sums up the Brits.

D.A. Prince

rachmaninoff
Singingly, wingingly,
Sergei Rachmaninoff’s
second concerto will
always sustain

thoughts of two people who,
nongratifyingly,
briefly encounter when
catching a train.

Sylvia Fairley

Rachmaninoff 
Thumpily-bumpily
Sergei Rachmaninoff —
piano concertos
he meant to be heard.

Loud orchestration and
hyper-sonority;
nobody sleeps through
his breath-taking Third.

D.A. Prince



cummings
Hookery-crookery
Cummings the SPAD-in-chief
Tested his eyes, driving
Miles down the road.

Yet, while he broke the rules
Unsurreptitiously
Met no police, unlike
Poor Mister Toad.

Jerome Betts

judas
Weakliy-sneakily

Judas Iscariot
Sold Jesus out for
A couple of bob.   

As an exemplar of
Apostolicity,
I’d say he didn’t 
Do that good a job.

Rob Stuart



bob
Wailing unfailingly,
Robert A. Zimmerman
filled up the airways from
Cork to Carmel,

sounding to some like his
nasopharyngeal
airways were frequently
filled up as well.


Alex Steelsmith

bud
          and ches
Under-the-Archily
Ches and Bud Flanagan
Cheered up the war years with
Song and with joke.

Twenty-first century
Culturalanalysts
Fiercely critique them for
Not being ‘woke’.

George Simmers


fields of the nephelim
Doomily, gloomily,
Fields of the Nephilim
Still get together to
Gig here and there,

Growling out songs that are
Incomprehensible,
Largely to people with
Black spiky hair.


Rob Stuart

flanders and swann
Skittily-wittily
Flanders and (Donald) Swann
entertained fans with their
musical brew.

Whole generations learned
involuntarily
names of closed stations and
what’s a g-nu.

D.A. Prince


Sergei Diaghilev
Dubious cubious,
Sergei Diaghilev
Said to Picasso, "These
Sketches? The pits!

Overexuberant
Cubism bites it. We're
Not gonna chop balle-
Rinas to bits."

Max Gutmann

Richtofen
Airily, dareily,
Baron von Richthofen
Foolishly painted his
Fokker bright red.

Blue could have granted him
Invisibility,
Stopping that Camel from
Feeding him lead.

Rob Stuart


Diary of a Nobody
Pooterly-suiterly
Weedon and Oliver,
Grossmiths whose diary-form
tales of a clerk

made lower middle class
respectability
glorious farce and a
bit of a lark.

D.A. Prince

gilbert and sullivan
Lyrically-miracly
Gilbert and Sullivan
two for the price of one
packed the Savoy;

bubbling with tunes and rhymes
phantasmagorical,
glorious plotting that’s
stuff to enjoy.

D.A. Prince


jesus
Honorous-onerous,
Jesus of Nazareth
Told his apostles, "You're
Very polite.

Nobody doubts that the
Title's well-meant, but, guys,
'Generalissimo'
Isn't quite right."


Max Gutmann

ludwig van
Wonderful thunderful
Ludwig van Beethoven
How you thrilled Alex with
Quartet and Fugue!

So it was sad when a
Psycholobotomy
Made you no longer his
Musical droog.

George Simmers

If you would like to
make contact with any of the authors of these double dactyls, whether to praise or castigate,
please click on the appropriate name:

Jerome Betts


Max Guttman

Chris O'Carroll

Sylvia Fairley

D.A. Prince

George Simmers

Alex Steelsmith

Rob Stuart



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