A Rhyme for Orange?

Marian Glaser © September, 2001

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A poet was driven strange

trying to find a rhyme for orange.

She found lots of half rhymes

like borage, forage and storage.

Also lots of sight rhymes

like mange, grange and range.

Two words might do it or

lead in weird directions as in

Robin Hood’s long bow range or

Dr. Zhivago doing the tango on the range.

She thought,

“The a in orange comes

close to the i in tinge or hinge.

A creaking hinge could fit in a mystery,

adorn sci-fi or archeology.

She thought, “Rhyming ‘orange’

is more difficult than playing hop-scotch

in a tree crotch with a sasquatch for a wrist-watch,

as Stompin’ Tom Connors would put it or

making Danny Kaye sing ‘’O girl from Saskatchewan

if you want a hen I’ll catch you one.”:.

I can think of rhymes for heebie-jeebies,

like freebie beebees.

I can rhyme rannygazoo with

too or toodle loo and

vo-de-o-do with row or hay-ho

but orange makes me

want to not be.

No more fighting to explain what I meant,

getting a paycheck worth more than a cent.

No more worries about paying the rent.

Maybe I’ll stop and go on a binge

in anticipation

of my liberation.”