Miss Conduct's 2nd Annual Clerihew Contest!

Miss Conduct (a/k/a Robin Abrahams)
Dispenses helpful advice with PhD in hand
Employing psychological perspecuity in surfeit
along with linguistic ingenuity, insight and wit

Now pitchman Billy Mays
Has seen the end of his days
And though it may seem somewhat nutty
I'm thrilled with my tube of Mighty Putty.

The life of the King of Pop
Has come to a sudden stop.
And now the Greatest Living American
Is Little Richard, born Richard Penniman.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
Rules Iran with an iron rod
But this despot's fate may someday be
Banishment. And for Persia, Democracy.

Farrah Fawcett (formerly Majors)
made winners of those who had wagers
on celebrity deaths in 2009
while those who had Jackson are cryin'.

James T. Kirk
Exiled for being a jerk
To a cold empty world - oh shock!
Not so, here's exiler's future self, Old Spock.

Marilyn Manson
Will someday headline a theater in Branson.
Every show will be a shocker
As he mumbles the lyrics and struts with his walker.

Kate Gosselin
Has eight kids whose situation is a no-win
Someday these small kids will grow
And have their own torrid reality show.

TV interviewer Larry King
Is someone I find nauseating:
At the heart of his celebrity patter
An unquenchable urge to gush and flatter.

Jean le Rond d'Alembert
Took a piece of camembert.
Dividing it with great urgence
He tested its convergence.

RIP, Jacko
Whether eccentric or wacko;
His moves - outtasight
Don't matter if he's black and then white

William Shakespeare
Had nary a peer . . .
'Cept we all might be mistaken
If the dude with the chops was Bacon.

Michael Jackson
Wanted to look Saxon
Poor guy got confused
While moguls inflicted abuse

Mr. Sasha Baron-Cohen
Is as stealthy as a protozoan.
When someone's composure least expects it
He infects and afflicts and thoroughly wrecks it.

Stephen Colbert
For those unaware
Feasts on comedy of ridicule so ironic
Some may charge blasphemy, but for me, its a tonic.

Charles Richter
Invented an earthquake depictor.
So if you live in a region quite shakable,
Make sure you keep nothing breakable.

Alex
was prolix
yet the African Grey
much loved parrot too soon passed away.

Dennis Eckersley
Jerry Remy, he will never be
Cans of corn and cheese that’s stinky is part of his baseball communication
Can we get sub titles for translation?

When it comes to chortling loudly at the boss's jokes, nobody can
like Ed McMahon
He knew his earthly race was run
when he got an envelope that said, YOU MAY ALREADY BE DONE

General John Sedgwick
At the Battle of Spotsylvania, was cut to the quick
As he scolded his troops, "They couldn't hit an elephant at this dist..."
...I don't think they missed.

Deceitful Bernie Madoff
Took clients' megabucks and paid off
His yacht, plane and homes--a major fiduciary breach.
One hundred fifty years for the leech of Palm Beach.

Joan Rivers' face
Is a monument to Rushmorean grace.
Mind you, it's tiny; a powder puff could span it.
But in terms of pliability it may as well be granite.

Beatrix Potter
Was a barrister's daughter
Possessed of fanciful habits
Involving mice, kittens, frogs, squirrels, ducks, pigs, and rabbits.

Michael Jackson
Died with his slacks on,
Which is more than you can say for David Carradine
Who was hanging around reading a naughty magazine.

Judge Sonia Sotomayor,
Her Ricci ruling is under fire.
But her chance is still fine
To become one of the SCOTUS nine.

CLERIHEW

E.C. Bentley,
who wrote fiction subsequently,
invented a rhyme called the Clerihew
one day when he had nothing better to do.

James Thurber
Made cartoons and stories about his wife that didn't disturb 'er.
The wife in "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" --
Don't you think the way he portrayed her was kinda rotten?

McMahon, Ms Fawcett, now Jackson too.
The loss of the Greatest makes me boo-hoo.
Not that I knew them or succumbed to their spell;
It's just that myself, I'm not feeling so well.

Mao Zedong, Mao Zedong --
How could one man be so wrong?
His Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution
Claimed even more lives than the Final Solution.

The incomparable Barbara Stanwyck:
A mere flick
Of her eyelash
Reduces mere mortals to cigarette ash.

RIP Ms Mollie Sugden.
You were so magnificent when in high dudgeon.
When someone was rude to Mrs. Slocum
She'd just poke 'im.

Mayor Tom Menino
Ain’t no thespian like Olivier or Pacino
At best, his diction and syntax confuses
And on some days he gives my ears bruises

Judge Sonia Sotamayor
Has a lilting surname linguists adore
But that lyrical emphasis at the last
Has put some news anchors’ tongues in a cast

Brontë, Charlotte,
Was not some literate harlot
With a dissipated life of illicit affairs;
She was hardworking and decent and never put on Eyres.

Farrah Fawcett:
A face with a smile across it,
A head of hair like a lion's mane,
A lion's courage in the face of pain.

Betty Davis
Intrigued us with that look she gave us
Angelically pledged to speak “good” of the dead
So when Joan Crawford died, “Good!” she said.

peter best didn't pass the test to stay as the Beatles drummer he left and the rest of his life was a bummer

Farrah Fawcett chose a bad day to expire
Her death got preempted from CNN wire
In favor of Jacko
Beauty doesn't sell as well as wacko

Bernie Madoff's claim to fame
Could have been predicted by his name
If of your money you are fond
Remember that "made off" means "abscond."

dr. seuss created characters most diffuse could he have achieved fame if he had signed his prose theodor geisel -his real name

Alexander Graham Bell
Visionary tho he was, never imagined the wireless cell
But would Pa Bell approve the ubiquitous devices now
When a bridesmaid’s intones "Ladies Night" during her bride’s wedding vows?

John Philip Sousa
His Marine Band was a lollapalooza!
The rest of us are merely clever
He wrote The Stars and Stripe Forever!

Let's look through the trunk
of Thelonious Sphere Monk
In only a few bars, his genius is clear:
Pannonica, 'Round Midnight, and Ruby My Dear

Cesar Millan
For the Dog Whisperer, no canine is ever too far gone.
He showed us that there's no truly bad doggie,
But, oh my, aren't some of their owners just awfully foggy!

Old Man in the Mountain
Fatal aneurism, its features a fountain.
Reenactment of glass might they try?
At foot; live free or die.