Huckster

HUCKSTER

–noun
1. a retailer of small articles, especially a peddler of fruits and vegetables; hawker.
2. a person who employs showy methods to effect a sale, win votes, etc.
3. a cheaply mercenary person.
4. Informal .
a. a persuasive and aggressive salesperson.
b. a person who works in the advertising industry, especially one who prepares aggressive advertising for radio and television.
–verb (used with object), verb (used without object)
5. to deal, as in small articles, or to make petty bargains.
6. to sell or promote in an aggressive and flashy manner.






















The vegetable man
Needs not be an huckster
His wares are selling
By sheer virtue of their look.

Poetaster

POETASTER

-noun
an inferior poet






















Her look nailed me for a poetaster
Cuddles would have to be offered
To placate her displeasure.

Psychopomp

PSYCHOPOMP

-noun
A guide of souls, one who escorts soul of a newly-deceased to the afterlife.



Later that night
My psychopomp arrived
In the guise of an old tea pot
Who hadn't quite realised
I was very much alive
Still.

Illabile

ILLABILE

-adj.
Incapable of falling or erring; infallible.



His brow talked about
A superb, illabile man
God in the making.
Folks mocked his jug ears, of course,
But incense was attractive.

Zaftig

ZAFTIG

-adj.
1.Full-bodied; well-proportioned.



Zaftig wine
To plump up my curves
And my smile.

Confrication

CONFRICATION

-noun
A rubbing together; friction.























Confrication
Paw on ear, ear on paw
Building up statics
Friendly human gets zapped

Artificer

ARTIFICER

-noun
1. An inventor.
2. A crafts-person.
3. A mechanic in the armed forces.























Time
That artificer
Cranking up centuries
Just to pass the time.

Paragon

PARAGON

–noun
1. a model or pattern of excellence or of a particular excellence.
2. Printing. a 20-point type.
3. an unusually large, round pearl.
–verb (used with object)
4. to compare; parallel.
5. to be a match for; rival.
6. Obsolete. to surpass.
7. Obsolete. to regard as a paragon.






















She want him to be a paragon
But he claims he's not the type

Risible

RISIBLE

-adj.
1. Laughable; ludicrous.
2. Disposed to laugh.
3. Relating to laughter.























The gull
Found the angel
Utterly risible:
Why the big wings if made of stone?

Atrabilious

ATRABILIOUS

–adj.
1. gloomy; morose; melancholy; morbid.
2. irritable; bad-tempered; splenetic.























Death proved so atrabilious
That it had so be put behind bars
Where it quickly grew morose.

Nebbish

NEBBISH

-noun
A pitifully timid or ineffectual person.






















Nebbish creature
Glad for green protection
No hugs today.

Mizzle

MIZZLE

–verb (used with object), verb (used without object)
1. to rain in fine drops; drizzle; mist.
–noun
2. mist or drizzle.


–verb (used without object)
British Slang . to disappear or leave suddenly.






















Frozen mizzle
Caught in a glass
For hotter days.

Acedia

ACEDIA

-noun
1. Sloth.
2. Laziness or indifference in religious matters.






















Cat!
Thy name is acedia;
Your dreams
Holding this world
Anchored into reality.

Advert

ADVERT

-verb
1. to turn the mind or attention
2. to call attention in the course of speaking or writing; make reference



Squinting
We can advert our perception
Divert our attention to the unseen
The guessed actions
Athena
In the palm of a vanished god

Haptic

HAPTIC

-adj.
1. Relating to the sense of touch; tactile.
-noun
1. The science that deals with the sense of touch.




Haptic creature
Hungry for caresses
And the feel of wind in its hair.

Bromidic

BROMIDIC

-adj.
Commonplace; trite.






















Siesta in a hammock
Bromidic feast of summer
Still enjoyable.

Abstemious

ABSTEMIOUS

–adj.
1. sparing or moderate in eating and drinking; temperate in diet.
2. characterized by abstinence
3. sparing.






















The beast had
An abstemious mind:
A sparse thought process
Compensated for by
An otherwise inordinate gluttony.

Restore

RESTORE

–verb (used with object)
1. to bring back into existence, use, or the like; re-establish.
2. to bring back to a former, original, or normal condition, as a building, statue, or painting.
3. to bring back to a state of health, soundness, or vigour.
4. to put back to a former place, or to a former position, rank, etc.
5. to give back; make return or restitution of (anything taken away or lost).
6. to reproduce or reconstruct (an ancient building, extinct animal, etc.) in the original state.




After the harvest,
The seasons slowly restore
Lemons into fruitful mode.

Dice

DICE

–noun
1. small cubes of plastic, ivory, bone, or wood, marked on each side with one to six spots, usually used in pairs in games of chance or in gambling.
2. any of various games, esp. gambling games, played by shaking and throwing from two to six dice or poker dice onto a flat surface.
3. any small cubes.
4. Auto Racing . a jockeying for lead position between two or more drivers in which tactics are used to pass or keep from being passed.
–verb (used with object)
5. to cut into small cubes.
6. to decorate with cube-like figures.
7. to lose by gambling with dice (often followed by “away”).
–verb (used without object)
8. to play at dice.
9. to cause or bring about by gambling with dice.
10.Auto Racing . to duel with another car or cars in a dice.






















Small dice
Cool delight
For a hot summer

Calenture

CALENTURE

–noun
Pathology. a violent fever with delirium, affecting persons in the tropics.
A tropical fever once believed to be caused by the heat.






















Against calenture
He spreads on the kitchen tiles.
This is all our fault.

Dingle

DINGLE

–noun
a deep, narrow cleft between hills; shady dell.






















There,
Lost
In the
Dark dingle,
The metallic dell
Of seemingly faltering love,
I have lost the key to your dreams.
Unable to mourn,
I rattle
The lock
In
Vain.


The background picture is copyright of Willow of Willow Manor, who has put it forth as a writing prompt.
Join the writing fun at Magpie Tales.

Aeromancy

AEROMANCY

-noun
The prediction of future events from observation of weather conditions.



More than forecast,
Aeromancy
Predicts beach days
And water games
To come

Persnickety

PERSNICKETY

-adj.
1. Fussy about minor details.
2. Snobbish.
3. Requiring keen attention to detail, as a job.



She was persnickety
Already in her young age
Finding defaults in her parents
And the world around her.
When the faeries seized her
She was elated to fly away
Leaving earth and clumsy shoes behind.

Antenna

ANTENNA

-noun
1. a conductor by which electromagnetic waves are sent out or received, consisting commonly of a wire or set of wires; aerial.
2. Zoology . one of the jointed, movable, sensory appendages occurring in pairs on the heads of insects and most other arthropods.



Shining frame
Disguised antennas
Beam me up.

Mephitic

MEPHITIC

-adj.
Poisonous or foul-smelling.






















Let me tell you a story
Of mephitic prophesies
And untimely death:
Butterflies flying into flames
By preordained orders
A skull on their wings

Procrustean

PROCRUSTEAN

–adj.
1. pertaining to or suggestive of Procrustes.
2. ( often lowercase ) tending to produce conformity by violent or arbitrary means.



Ready for summer
Through Procrustean diets.
Gulls couldn't care less.

Revel

REVEL

–verb (used without object)
1. to take great pleasure or delight (usually followed by “in” ).
2. to make merry; indulge in boisterous festivities.
–noun
3. boisterous merrymaking or festivity; revelry.
4. Often, revels. an occasion of merrymaking or noisy festivity with dancing, masking, etc.
























After you are gone...
I revel in the scent of you
Over the battered pillows


The background picture is copyright of Willow of Willow Manor, who has put it forth as a writing prompt.
Join the writing fun at Magpie Tales.

Equipoise

EQUIPOISE

-noun
1. A state of balance.
2. Something that serves as a counterbalance.
-verb tr.
To counterbalance.























Reaching out
Exercise in equipoise
All for cream

Epigraph

EPIGRAPH

-noun
1. An inscription on a building or statue.
2. A quotation introducing a book or a chapter.






















Raised in honour
Remaining for luck
The epigraph failed to close an era
Leaving ghosts behind.

Calamistration

CALAMISTRATION

-noun
The act or process of curling hair.



Her calamistration skills
Were most unusual:
Not many people use snakes
As curling irons

Overarch

OVERARCH

–verb (used with object)
1. to span with or like an arch.
–verb (used without object)
2. to form an arch over something.























Suddenly
All our projects
Are overarching
Virtual rainbows
Set in words
Raising questions

Stenosis

STENOSIS

-noun
A narrowing of a passage, vessel, or an opening in the body.























Our skyline was blocked
Cancelled by haphazard roofs.
Urban stenosis.

Nimbus

NIMBUS

-noun
1. A rain cloud.
2. A halo or aura around the head of a person depicted in a piece of art.























A most stormy saint
His nimbus angry with rain
Salt on open wounds

Rampant

RAMPANT

–adj.
1. violent in action or spirit; raging; furious.
2. growing luxuriantly, as weeds.
3. in full sway; prevailing or unchecked.
4. (of an animal) standing on the hind legs; ramping.
5. Heraldry . (of a beast used as a charge) represented in profile facing the dexter side, with the body upraised and resting on the left hind leg, the tail and other legs elevated, the right foreleg highest, and the head in profile unless otherwise specified.
6. Architecture . (of an arch or vault) springing at one side from one level of support and resting at the other on a higher level.



A slow burning
Rampant amber
Desire
Without boundaries
But under cover
Never extinguishable
Not even bottom up


The background picture is copyright of Willow of Willow Manor, who has put it forth as a writing prompt.
Join the writing fun at Magpie Tales.

Paean

PAEAN

-noun
An expression of praise, joy, or triumph, traditionally in the form of a song.






















He launched into a paean
Singing the stones cooling his belly
The sun warming his fur and bones
The fat birds he intended to snack on
(after their concert was finished)
Or the titbits I might feed him instead.

Compotation

COMPOTATION

–noun
an act or instance of drinking or tippling together.






















Under the stars
We revel in
Compotation
Sharing dreams while
Sharing glasses.

Macerate

MACERATE

-verb
1 : to cause to waste away by or as if by excessive fasting
2 : to cause to become soft or separated into constituent elements by or as if by steeping in fluid; broadly : steep, soak
3 : to soften and wear away especially as a result of being wetted or steeped






















I could not bear to macerate much longer
So elected to macerate my innards instead.

Nidifugous

NIDIFUGOUS

-adj.
Leaving the nest soon after hatching






















Distracted?
My thoughts are nidifugous
And often devoured
By lurking predators

Perspicuity

PERSPICUITY

–noun
1. clearness or lucidity, as of a statement.
2. the quality of being perspicuous.






















In a state of perspicuity
I saw the ripples of time
Scoring the surface of nature
As on a long playing disk
Singing the evanescent song
Of fragility and grace.

Abirritate

ABIRRITATE

–verb (used with object)
Medicine/Medical. to reduce irritation or sensitiveness.






















Ricotta and tomatoes
Paragons of coolness
Abirritate summer's heat.

Spry

SPRY

-adj.
active; nimble; agile; energetic; brisk.



The spry creature
Shows the same energy
In every action
Be it hunt or
The noble art of snoozing

Bellicose

BELLICOSE

–adj.
inclined or eager to fight; aggressively hostile; belligerent; pugnacious.






















Years of living here
Should protect me
Against sudden anger
- Look! A real life Chirico! –
But I still get bellicose
At the sight of dumps.

Inane

INANE

–adj.
1. lacking sense, significance, or ideas; silly:
2. empty; void.
–noun
3. something that is empty or void, especially the void of infinite space.



Inane mind:
Listen close to the ear
and hear the sea roar.

Trophy

TROPHY

–noun
1. anything taken in war, hunting, competition, etc., especially when preserved as a memento; spoil, prize, or award.
2. anything serving as a token or evidence of victory, valour, skill, etc.
3. a carving, painting, or other representation of objects associated with or symbolic of victory or achievement.
4. any memento or memorial.
5. a memorial erected by certain ancient peoples, especially the Greeks and Romans, in commemoration of a victory in war and consisting of arms or other spoils taken from the enemy and hung upon a tree, pillar, or the like.























Full of tears
Sodden trophies
Waiting for sunshine.
A victory.

Yahoo

YAHOO

–noun
1. (in Swift's Gulliver's Travels ) one of a race of brutes, having the form and all the vices of humans, who are subject to the Houyhnhnms.
2. ( lowercase ) an uncultivated or boorish person; lout; philistine; yokel.
3. ( lowercase ) a coarse or brutish person.






















A case of mistaken identity;
His look identifying him as a yahoo.
But that bear is a philosopher:
Thoughts are all he has left to escape.

Billow

BILLOW

–noun
1. a great wave or surge of the sea.
2. any surging mass.
–verb (used without object)
3. to rise or roll in or like billows; surge.
4. to swell out, puff up, etc., as by the action of wind.
–verb (used with object)
5. to make rise, surge, swell, or the like























Hairy billows
Greeted him each morning
Waiting to be coiffed
Over and over
Into temporary submission
Until the next wave
Of dreams.

Demure

DEMURE

-adj.
1. characterized by shyness and modesty; reserved.
2. affectedly or coyly decorous, sober, or sedate.



Sitting on my shoulder,
Demure and prim
But for excessive drooling
My inner-monster points out faults,
Phantasmagorical errors,
Implanting self doubt
In a meek ego.

Resentment

RESENTMENT

–noun
the feeling of displeasure or indignation at some act, remark, person, etc., regarded as causing injury or insult.



This I write
With your blood.
If not your blood,
Your resentment.
Clouding the page
With tight signs
Hiding our escape
Into another
World.


Albertus Seba's squid engraving from his 'Cabinet of Natural Curiosities' appears courtesy of Peacay , of BlibliOdyssey fame.

Pomegranate

POMEGRANATE

–noun
1. a chambered, many-seeded, globose fruit, having a tough, usually red rind and surmounted by a crown of calyx lobes, the edible portion consisting of pleasantly acid flesh developed from the outer seed coat.
2. the shrub or small tree, Punica granatum, that bears it, native to south-western Asia but widely cultivated in warm regions.























There’s a fragile rose inside my window,
Made of pomegranate blossoms and seeds
Ruffled under the hand of antic winds
Turned blue under restoration frosting

Calendar

CALENDAR

–noun
1. a table or register with the days of each month and week in a year.
2. any of various systems of reckoning time, especially with reference to the beginning, length, and divisions of the year.
3. a list or register, esp. one arranged chronologically, as of appointments, work to be done, or cases to be tried in a court.
4. a list, in the order to be considered, of bills, resolutions, etc., brought before a legislative body.
5. Obsolete . a guide or example.
–verb (used with object)
6. to enter in a calendar; register.






















Broken calendar
Singing days long gone
Planning a mockery