Juvenalia

My mother has been cleaning out closets and finding all kinds of embarrassing stuff, including this silly poem which I must have wrote at 13 or 14. (I’m sure someone told me the Phoo Bird joke. I just set it to rhyme.)

You can all see what a tragedy it was when I quit writing poetry.

The Phoo Bird
By Jennifer Kern (now Kelly)

Once there were three hungry girls
Went out to stalk the cold, hard world
When they stopped to take a rest
The Phoo bird rose from his Phoo nest
Smelling warm and human blood
The Phoo dove down and spewed his crud
The first girl ran off crying “Eck!”
The Phoo bird shit upon her neck
The second shouted out “Beware!”
The Phoo bird shit upon her hair
The third waited for the Phoo to pass
The Phoo bird shit upon her dress
When the Phoo had finished work
He settled down to wipe and smirk
All three girls were scattered far
From any local grill or bar
Where they tell their recent troubles
And wash them down with drink that bubbles
Instead they gathered by a stream
A tired group with spots of green
Dotting their neck and hair and dress
It annoyed them to some excess
The first on knelt beside the stream
To wash her neck and get it clean
As soon as water hit the spot
The Phoo-dew slid off in a clot
The girl stood up and clutched her head
And then fell over cold and dead
The second girl was none too bright
And so with the corpse in her sight
She washed away her own Phoo shit
But started back as if it bit
When she saw how the others died
The youngest for ten seconds cried
The Phoo bird’s gift to her remained
On her own dress (otherwise unstained)
The girl led a long, happy life
She met a slob, became his wife
She has advice if you can bear it
She says, “If the Phoo shits, wear it.”

Okay, that's it. Music stuff in a little bit.