HINTS ON PRONUNCIATION
I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you
On hiccough, thorough, laugh and through?
Well done! And now you wish perhaps
To learn of these familiar traps?
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you
On hiccough, thorough, laugh and through?
Well done! And now you wish perhaps
To learn of these familiar traps?
Beware of heard, a dreadful word,
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead: it’s said like bed, not bead,
For Goodness’ sake, don’t call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat,
They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.
That looks like beard and sounds like bird,
And dead: it’s said like bed, not bead,
For Goodness’ sake, don’t call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat,
They rhyme with suite and straight and debt.
A moth is not a moth in mother
Nor both in bother, broth in brother,
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there’s does and rose and lose-
Just look them up: and goose and choose.
Nor both in bother, broth in brother,
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear for bear and pear,
And then there’s does and rose and lose-
Just look them up: and goose and choose.
And cork and work and card and ward
And font and front and word and sword.
And do and go and thwart and cart-
Come, come, I’ve hardly made a start!
A dreadful language! Man Alive,
I’d mastered it when I was five.
English is terrible! This poem proves it. How a language can break so many rules (or have so many inconsistencies) and flourish is surprising. Should we that k Shaekspeare and Kind James?
ReplyDeleteI wonder where the tipping point for this author was when he wrote this poem. A writer, a reader, perhaps a teacher? I have found that often it is not until we go to teach someone else, say the English language, do we really question the information. Our brain can unfiltered so many things as we are excited about learning and it is the unfiltering where a lot of deeper learning occurs.
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