A Very Long Word

Laughter does not have to come from a major source. It could indeed be ... relatively minor.

Interested in different genres of writing, I took a ‘stanza’ and decided to try my hand at poetry. Inspired right away, I signed up for Poetry Potluck’s monthly email, created by two professional poets. Each month, they feature a random list of words and require you to use at least five of them in your poem. It sounded simple enough! Surely, a little rhythm and rhyme could shape an expressive idea through creative writing.

Looking through the list, familiar words appeared — drink, meatloaf, and mud. But after turning the page, disbelief set in: pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis sat at the top. Not only was it impossible to pronounce (Hooked on Phonics worked for me), but keeping all those letters on the page was a feat in itself. The word was so long that the vowels nearly toppled off the edge.

Credit AI for the illustration.

Always ready for a good challenge, the next hurdle was obvious: find something that rhymes with that nineteen-syllable monstrosity. Meatloaf wouldn’t cut it, and mud didn’t even come close. A few drinks might be necessary just to brainstorm a rhyme for that one.

Google offered suggestions: cosa nervosa, nodosa, mimosa, mucosa, granulosa, samosa, aeruginosa, and submucosa. After reading that list, survival itself felt questionable. A doctor, and perhaps a prescription, might be required. That’s simply too many ‘osa’s for one bloodstream!

Then a childhood memory surfaced: Mary Poppins insisting, “Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.”

Perhaps supercalifragilisticexpialidocious was exactly what was needed. It might be a bit ferocious and carry a slight risk of thrombosis, but smaller doses could make tackling pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis possible.

Now the real challenge remains, finding something that rhymes with mud.

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