Heh, heh — I don’t want to distract anyone from the previous post with my tomfoolery, so if you haven’t read “Thin Walls” yet, click up there on those blue words and read my Christmas recollections. But if you’ve been there and done that, here’s a silly little something that I found — quite literally — at the back of my closet. Today I was putting away my late autumn jacket, since its days of usefulness are gone for another year. (I’m now into my Totally Serious Winter Coat.) And at the back of my closet, behind the hanging shirts . . . no, there was no lamppost, no entrance to Narnia . . . but there was an old corkboard from my previous apartment. And still pinned to the corkboard was this sonnet that I wrote several years ago.

Now, who can tell me what sort of sonnet this is? Is it Petrarchan or Shakespearian? Is it Italian or English? Do they still teach such things in school? The first person to ring in with the right answer gets the privilege of making a request or suggestion for the next posting on this blog — which I may well use, if I in my megalomaniacal dictatorship of this blog see it fit to use. And maybe I’ll knight you.

Anyway, here it is, and it’s a tribute to all of us who collect rejection slips from editors:

“Me Again, Dear Editor”

My novel didn’t grab you by the throat,

Nor did my memoir meet your present needs;

You’ve sent back every story, and I quote:

My articles are “inept from the ledes.”

To place a piece with you seems quite a stunt.

My poetry’s not potent, and I swear

This endless fretting over what you want

Has got me pulling out my thinning hair.

But (lucky you!) my newest work’s complete!

My critics say it’s lacking in suspense,

And characters and story, yet replete

With details that appeal to every sense.

It doesn’t have a strong protagonist,

But find enclosed my latest grocery list.

Heh, heh, heh! Well, is this the Third Day of Christmas? May you enjoy talking to the three French hens your true love sent to you. Personally, I’m glad I got my electric carpet out of storage, vacuumed it, and spread it here under my desk. It’s warming my feet as I write these words. And now it’s back to my expansion of “The Star Shard” into a novel to be called The Star Shard. (Notice how I did that with the italics? That’s how to make a novel out of a short story. In case you ever need to know.)