Limerick kid

He was a kid then, not all of his friends were markedly so. Some of them were touching their adolescence and were clearly not in control of all the hormones, but he was a kid and was enjoying it as much as a parodying parrot enjoys parodying without realizing the meaning of it.

So one day this kid develops an urge to recite a poem to a girl he had developed a liking for some time back without realizing why he liked her. And as you’d know it happens with a lot of us and a lot amongst those to whom it happens, it also happens that they are so comfortable with the confusion that to save their relationships they produce kids and live for them. Anyway, as I continue let me mention that he did notice, though, that till some time back his feelings towards girls were no different than they were towards anyone. But now they were. If an adult were to describe it, he’d say now they appeared attractive and the same adult would also add, in an attempt to make things clear, that by ‘they’ he meant those girls and by ‘those girls’ he meant the ones who appeared attractive now. Anyway, now this kid wants to recite a poem to one such girl or, may be, she wasn’t just one such girl and that is why he wanted to recite a poem to her.

Twinkle they do

Why them stars

If you have to too

You’ll need energy bars



And he wrote these first four lines of verse, looked at them smugly, put the pen down as there were no computers then, so he put his pen down, as there were no computers then, oh I think , I have said that before, so he put his pen down, now this is for the sake of maintaining continuity, and he continued to look at it for some time, smugly, smiling and visualising her without realizing that what he was doing was actually an act of visualizing; he hadn’t yet heard the word. He thought she’d be impressed, that’s what he wanted to do and he wanted to impress her with smartness, which we adults would describe as childlike childishness. And then as a natural act of consulting others in matters of utmost importance, as it comes to most humans naturally, given our tendency to be safe than sorry and in some cases very or in even fewer and more important instances extremely sorry, he decided to show it to his father, who could be seen not being there in the room presently. So the kid decides to go the room where his father could be seen and heard,

“What have you been up to?” he asked as the kid approached him.

“I have been writing a poem” the kid replied

“Poems, gentlemen, the kid is writing poems” his father announced in some sort of a mocked imitation of a pink Floyd song.

‘ok, show me your poem’ he continued

He read it and exclaimed,

‘Ha!, such bad nonsense, it’s even worse than what I had written once as I had for once aspired to be a poet, hope you don’t intend to become a poet. At least live up to your name Limerick!” his father continued.

He, the kid, in the meanwhile, started wondering if his name might in some situations lead to a vulgar implication if either of his parents, later on, once he became a poet and started writing Limericks by any chance, boasted ‘Limerick does limericks’. But then he dropped the thought right away as someone had told him once that if you don’t drop thoughts soon enough, you are in the danger of becoming a philosopher and a philosopher is not something that anyone wants to become.

So, anyway, it was the first time his father had talked to him about becoming anything. Earlier whenever he’d even remotely allude to becoming something in life, his father would always chide him into believing that it was not his age to start thinking about becoming something. Last such instance was some months back.

You take my pen

I take yours

If caught

We’ll say, ahem!

That is how his father’s first poem had gone, we know it because he had just recited it to his son, who looked at his father in admiration for his spontaneity, who in turn looked at his son again, aghast; again; and now his father could safely assume that not only was he a bad poet but was also bad at recognizing bad poems. And he did.

‘Wow’ he said and now it was his father’s turn to look at him. Aghast , he looked and gave up and told him to go back to his room. In the meanwhile somehow we’d find his mother there in his room, reading up some other pieces he had written,

What have been up to? She asks

I have been writing poems, he responds

‘Ah, poems gentlemen, the kid is writing poems’, she announced in some sort of a mocked imitation of a pink Floyd song.

And the kid suddenly got a feeling of déjà vu, but soon he realized it was his father making that statement earlier, so he concluded that it was not déjà vu.

‘Let me read it’ she said and extended her hand, which returned to her with the piece of paper her son had written the poem on. it doesn’t matter how it got there. Let’s assume he gave it to her.

‘hmmmm, hmmmmm, twinkle, hmmmm, stars, hmmmmm....energy...bars’ she finished and looked at her son, with a blank face, then lovingly and then proceeded to kiss her forehead and added,

“I always knew you’d be creative, did you show it to your dad, I am sure he’d be proud of it. We were so right in naming you Limerick, limerick.”

‘Yeah I did, but he didn’t really say anything, he seemed to be writing something’ he said without ever looking up at her.

‘I am sure he is at his poetry again, how many times I need to tell him he’s not good with it’ she remarked and kissed her son again.