To be bad at poetry is also an art

“The wind blows whoosh-whoosh,
Like a teacher saying shush-shush,
A mosquito sat on my hand,
I went to swat it and…
It buzzed in my ear,
That its life is also dear,
Battered in the bad weather,
Like pebbles in a blender…”

Okay I’ll stop! But if you did not know, today is a day dedicated to bad poetry. There are so many days celebrated internationally. While some have meanings and motives, others are for fun. The simple answer to why we celebrate this day is “because we can”! That’s true. Although the origin of this day is not completely clear, it is believed that it was first celebrated by a group of friends who sent bad poetry to their English teacher as a prank. Whatever be the reason, it is fun to have some fun without rules! Everyone who understands Hindi and who has seen the TV show Sarabhai vs Sarabhai will immediately think of the character Rosesh reading out some of his poetry. You are right! It is an example of bad poetry. In honor of this day, let’s read some hilarious bad poetry together in different languages (translated to English as well), starting with one from Rosesh. I asked some of my friends and family to write some really bad poems and they were gracious enough to try their best to be bad. Here are some of their creations.

Tring Tring baji phone ki ghanti,
Usne bola mera naam hai Bunty,
Fir woh bola Namaste Maya aunty,
Maine bola, I am Rosesh, sorry Bunty.

For our English readers, here is the translated (equally bad) version: –
Tring Tring sounded the phone bell,
My name is Bunty, he tell,
Greetings to Maya Aunty he said,
I am Rosesh, sorry Bunty, I said.

— Rosesh (Sarabhai vs Sarabhai TV show)

Life gave me lemons, i made some soup
I tried to drink it, it was ewww.
When life gives you lemons, put them in a blender
Go home you are drunk, it’s not a blender.
When life gives you lemons, throw them all away
Go to store, buy a pizza, eat it on the way.

Prakhar Sahay

Just like humpty-dumpty sat on a wall,
Santa and banta cracked a joke to all.
Wearing pants and shirt they laughed it off,
Only to find their clothes were a high end knock-off.
Whilst trying to act intelligent they messed things up,
The poor pant they wore both figuratively and practically teared up.
Knowing nothing about life they ate a strawberry,
Not knowing to survive in this world one had to do high-end robbery!

Sandhya Radhakrishnan

चींटी पर चींटी,
चींटी पर शेर.
छोटी सी है मेरी चींटी,
छोटा सा शेर.

For my English readers,
Ant on an ant
On the ant is a lion.
My ant is small
So is my lion.

Mahima Chaudhary

पतीले पे पतीला,
पतीले में चिमटा,
somebody sucks at poems,
बाक़ी लोगों को गाने की चिंता

For my English readers,
Vessel in a vessel.
in which exists a pair of tongs.
Somebody sucks at poems,
Others suck at songs

Himadri Parashar

गिरते गिरते कोई गिरा,
फिर गिर के फिर गिरा,
गिरने से पता चला,
नीचे ही तो वह गिरा

For my English readers,
Somebody fell down after tripping,
And again fell down,
Falling down made him realize,
That he keeps falling down.

Mahima Pandey

खट्टा मीठा आम पापड़,
मैंने खाया लिज्जत पापड़,
मम्मी ने हमको मारा झापड़

For my English readers,
Mango candy bittersweet,
I ate a savory treat,
But from my mother, I received a thrashing treat.

Sunanda Bhambhota

I apologize if bad poetry traumatized you! But I believe this day should be continued to be celebrated so that we actually appreciate good poetry. You can leave anything that you come up with in the comments so that we can all have a laugh together! I will end with a quote from Oscar Wilde that perfectly sums up the day: –

“All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic.”

Oscar Wilde

Cover image credits: Frenzzgoa, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Keep laughing! Be inspired! Be satisfied! Be Priya-fied!