Katrina Morrison of Oklahoma is our host today for the second day of the March Open Write at http://www.ethicalea.com. You can read her full prompt here. She explains that misheard lyrics are called Mondegreen. I’m a fan of Coxy.Official, and when the whole bed is shaking with my laughter at night, my husband knows I’m watching Nathan Cox on Tik Tok. He’s the king of music Mondegreen, and so thanks to Katrina, I now know this misheard lyric genre has a name. Coxy’s short clips are for adults, and it’s not the words as much as his reactions that get my tickle box turned over. Now it makes me want to go find the exact lyrics for all those songs I often mis-sang growing up. I was never sure whether Clapton was saying she don’t ride, she don’t ride, she don’t ride cocaine or she’s alright, she’s alright, she’s alright cocaine, but either way you sing it, it works in the song.
My poem is about a text that became our own new phrase shortly after we married.
Loyding On Purpose Now
notification
his familiar text ding~ I
knew what it would say
same time, each morning
and his words never get old
or lose their meaning
I pulled up his text
unaware it would become
our new word for love
his ear-clogged iPhone
or else his autocorrect
sauced up his message:
I loyd you, he’d sent
over and over I laughed
trying to respond
in all-cap letters
I replied: I LOYD YOU, TOO
we’ve been loyding since
Common Threads 