Meyran Kraus
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Original text in yellow, anagram in pink.
A segment from the witches' chant in 'Macbeth' anagrammed into a poem about Halloween props, in which a relevant form appears when the letters EVIL are "carved out" in the poem's body text. |
A small sample from a coven's spell verses found in the play "MacBeth"
Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Silver'd in the moon's eclipse,
Nose of Turk and Tartar's lips,
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron.
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The Halloween-Minded Items We Schemed
Evil frock and odd, dark veil,
Leopard fangs and cotton tail,
Lush chiffon or shocking gore,
Purposeless and hostile roars;
Wart peeled off a killer frog,
Taffy "livers" of live "dogs",
Tartan, worn high on our brat,
Thumbs that bleed or hobo hat,
Short, fat-bellied candy bags,
Madcap vagrant's darkest rags;
Gummy, simple, fiendish worms
Mask a pale, ill being's form...
Let's conduct that fancy-free,
Vile and doom-fraught jubilee!
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Emily Dickinson's poem anagrammed into a poem from a Native American POV that functions as an acrostic displaying the holiday name down each first letter; it's also a quiz: each line contains a food item for the holiday feast in anagram form. Can you find all 12? |
Thanksgiving Day
One day is there of the series
Termed Thanksgiving Day,
Celebrated part at table,
Part in memory.
Neither patriarch nor pussy,
I dissect the play;
Seems it, to my hooded thinking,
Reflex holiday.
Had there been no sharp subtraction
From the early sum,
Not an acre or a caption
Where was once a room —
Not a mention, whose small pebble
Wrinkled any bay,
Unto such, were such assembly,
'Twere Thanksgiving Day.
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Indian Poem
The Ravaged cry in exiled gloom
Here in my tribe's now-secret tomb,
As each drum plays the bitter lore
No mopey Red-Skin may ignore.
Keen boys that want gifts, fun and play,
So careless of this harsh dismay,
Grasp no apt truth; no barren cry
I cried when heinous men came by!
Vile apes that eat the turkey now,
I breathe this rarely whispered vow:
Not one shall take my true old den -
Ghosts banished can attack again.
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Christina Rossetti's sonnet about Christmas anagrammed into a sonnet about Christmas cards, which also functions as a Christmas card itself when:
a) A line is drawn through all of the anagram's g's following the alphabetical order of the 1st letters in the words that contain them;
b) Every 2nd word in the even-numbered lines is marked. |
'All Saints' by Christina G. Rossetti
They have brought gold and spices to my King,
Incense and precious stuffs and ivory;
O holy Mother mine, what can I bring
That so my Lord may deign to look on me?
They sing a sweeter song than I can sing,
All crowned and glorified exceedingly:
I, bound on earth, weep for my trespassing,
They sing the song of love in heaven, set free.
Then answered me my Mother, and her voice
Spake to my heart, yea answered in my heart:
'Sing, saith He to the heavens, to earth, Rejoice:
Thou also lift thy heart to Him above:
He seeks not thine, but thee such as thou art,
For lo, His banner over thee is Love.'
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A classic sonnet anagrammed into a poem about recent tragedies that also contains 5 acrostics detailing the transformation of EARTH into HEART, which is animated below it. |
Comfort
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Speak low to me, my Saviour, low and sweet
From out the hallelujahs, sweet and low
Lest I should fear and fall, and miss Thee so
Who art not missed by any that entreat.
Speak to me as to Mary at thy feet
And if no precious gums my hands bestow,
Let my tears drop like amber while I go
In reach of thy divinest voice complete
In humanest affection -- thus, in sooth,
To lose the sense of losing. As a child,
Whose song-bird seeks the wood for evermore
Is sung to in its stead by mother's mouth
Till, sinking on her breast, love-reconciled,
He sleeps the faster that he wept before.
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Poem of Faith
East Asia aches
And buildings break,
Roofs drifting off to sea;
The shops in center Tokyo shake,
Hit by this lunacy.
Emotions flow,
As one more blow
Reminds New Zealand's lot
How far will Nature often go
To show it calls the shots.
Eternal threats
Abound, and yet
Humanity still fights,
Relentless in the strife to set
The looming problems right:
Events like these
Have sparked the pleas
And bids of potent crews,
Resolved to soothe, from overseas,
The most unwelcome bruise.
How may we aid
Each just crusade
At once? I'll pen my view:
Remember that the ones dismayed
Tomorrow might be you.
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Fulke Greville's sonnet Caelica 86 is anagrammed into three sonnets depicting symbols from the three major monotheistic religions, which spell out O-N-E. |
Love is the Peace, whereto all thoughts do strive,
Done and begun with all our powers in one:
The first and last in us that is alive,
End of the good, and therewith pleased alone.
Perfection's spirit, Goddess of the Mind,
Pass'ed through hope, desire, grief and fear,
A simple Goodness in the flesh refined,
Which of the joys to come doth witness bear.
Constant, because it sees no cause to vary,
A Quintessence of Passions overthrown,
Raised above all that change of objects carry,
A Nature by no other nature known:
For Glory's of eternity a frame,
That by all bodies else obscures her name.
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The Hebrew Wit
The suffering of beaten Hebrew masses
Hands every honored Jew that ever lived
That right to sport a feeble sneer and glasses
And to forgo no sorrow once perceived:
Each "oy" our legions of deep "bubbies" sigh
Is a profound yet colorful refrain;
Eight thousand stereos shan't quite defy
The echo of that riotous disdain.
Each boss or landlord our tribe serves sees "kvetches",
Yet no commotion or opposing stands;
A wise team of polite and patient "mensches"
Can weather holocausts in any land.
The tyrannies of hated gits all fall;
A Jew shan't panic - he endures it all.
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The Pieta of St. Peter's Basilica
Some well-known artists who are pure of heart
May also, in an awe-filled state of fear,
Design an unconvincing bit of art
Within an inconvenient atmosphere.
However, can one doubt that valued grace
Preserved in an effective elegy
That's shown in that reputed godly place,
A solid boon unwrapped, for all to see?
The holy Son and Mother are at rest,
His face benign; Hers gray, but so adored,
As Jesus, on one's rosy chest, dies blessed:
The sober ending of the highest Lord.
Those quiet tears shed here did come across:
Our joy is but the offshoot of her loss.
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Of Iraq
A boor, who's ignorant of Arab lands,
With Yankee eyes blind as a common bat,
Would see these epic spans of scorching sand
And feel deep hate toward our habitat.
A free breed shouldn't cherish vanity:
I see green colors, not dead plants or roots;
I see steep cliffs' serene eternity;
I see sweet fruits, and even jam, to boot.
A deer seems valid on these thriving crops;
A sheep feeds on thin heathers growing tall...
I'd feel deep love for that, which cannot stop;
That cheery element that bonds us all.
You can see everlasting things for hours,
If you just show good faith - but honor ours.
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Updated: May 10, 2016
