Why?

Dear Geeta,

You are absolutely correct. I think the Greeks need to be blamed for having asked "Why?" This is most likely the case, for WHY has always sounded Greek to me!!

ojaantrik

 

Dear Viswa,

Happy New Year!

Your response to my post brought up a whole lot of new possibilities to my mind. Amongst them, the fly’s determination to build its nest on a specific spot on one’s nose appears to be the most likely one. This being the case, I am worried. I mean if it sits on the tip of my nose and either Cheeniya or you or both of you happen to be unemployed, I shudder to think what could happen to my nose with the two you making a living by fly swatting. Yes, I will need to beat a hasty retreat from Chennai. Not because I believe the two of you were not created, but because I would be dearly missing my once created but soon to depart nose.

Not that I wouldn’t enjoy watching Cheeniya and you aiming at each other’s noses. But I will probably wear a medieval knight’s headgear to follow the proceedings to their end!

You have left me deeply worried and immersed in thought.

ojaantrik

 

Thank you Srama. I am familiar with both verses you have quoted. Ogden Nash has posed a bit of a challenge for me. I am simply fascinated by the originality of the style he had evolved. It's hard to reproduce. Take for example

"Who wants my jellyfish?
I'm not sellyfish!"

Or, this one:

"The wasp and all his numerous family
I look upon as a major calamity.
He throws open his nest with prodigality,
But I distrust his waspitality."

And so on and so forth. He created a new language that few have been able to imitate.

I was drowning to start with, but now I am just about learning to remain afloat.

Happy New Year to your loved ones and you.

oj-da

 

Dear kkrish:

I agree. This is yet another of his well-known and fascinating ones. It does not display the best he could do with words, but it does indicate the direction in which he was moving. The play with "fly", "fly", "flea", "flea" gives you a hint of the other gems in his treasure trove. Such as:

" ... if called by a panther
Don't anther."

As I told Srama, Nash is mind boggling. My mind at least is swimming.

Best wishes.

oj

 

Dear HariLakhera,

Wonderful suggestion I must say. I wish Nash were alive. He might have appreciated it. In my mother tongue, there is an expression "the fly swatting clerk". It usually refers to a lazy person or a person working in an office where there is no work to do.

oj

 

Lovely!! Include Bengali confectionery too!!

oj

 

Exactly so! Any physicist should agree. It all began with the Big Bang!

oj

 

Dear Cheeniya,
Ogden Nash did write a number of limericks. But I am drawn towards his non- limericks. I suppose this is the final literary challenge I will try and face upto, having been defeated by all the others I took up. Let’s hope I can be prolific at least, even if terriblyfic! This last word shows what Nash has done to me!
oj