Epizeugma

Posted on July 25, 2025 | Leave a comment

Epizeugma (ep-i-zoog’-ma): Placing the verb that holds together the entire sentence (made up of multiple parts that depend upon that verb) either at the very beginning or the very ending of that sentence.

Driving to Rhode Island was always an adventure. I couldn’t find it on my GPS. Google maps said it was too small for their database and nobody went there anyway. I had an old paper map that I used when I went on vacation there. They still had human toll takers that said “Welcome” when you paid the toll to cross into the state. It was ass-backwards, but if you yelled “Chowda” they let you in for free.

I was headed for Woonsocket. Whenever I said it, I envisioned a giant wall outlet. I couldn’t help it with my poetic sensibility. I stayed in a motel perched on the Blackstone River. I was warned years ago never to even dip my toe in it or my toe would melt off my foot. I thought the motel proprietor was teasing me, but I stayed away from the river anyway, especially when I saw a basketball sneaker float by with what looked like an ankle sticking out.

But I loved Woonsocket, especially exploring all the abandoned buildings and writing poems about them. I wrote this one after exploring an abandoned shoe factory:

“There’s no business like shoe business

It’s like no business I know

It has soles, but also heels

And buckles and bows

So, let’s get with a shoe!”

I wrote this sitting on the abandoned factory floor with my head full of shoe business images, banging away on my I-pad with a parade of motorcycle boots, loafers, wingtips and golf shoes dancing in my head, stomping like step dancers at an Irish cultural festival making me dizzy with poetic inspiration and heating up my I-pad.

This was the essence of my Woonsocket experience. It’s why I came back year after year. But this year, things were a little different. I had met a woman down the hall named Hiney Birch. We hit it off immediately and had dinner at the “Chowda House” the first night we met. I got drunk and chased her around with a live lobster I grabbed from the lobster tank. We were thrown out of the “Chowda House.”

We went back to my room and Hiney recited the “Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” It was fascinating, but it made me thirsty and I fell asleep from a feeling of being becalmed. When I woke up in the morning Hiney was gone and she had checked out of the motel. I was heartbroken until I discovered she had stolen my false teeth from the jar next to my bed.

I opened the door and my uppers were hanging there on a length of fishing line rigged with a large fishing hook with a message hanging from it: “Fishing is wishing. Catch yourself a dream.” I jumped in my car and headed for the beach at Newport. It took awhile to get there. I rented a fishing rod and rigged my uppers to the hook and baited them with a squid.

I waded into the ocean and cast my line. I was going to catch a tuna! A shark! A swordfish! Instead, I hooked into a bicycle someone had thrown overboard. It was great fun reeling it in! When I pulled it out on the sand I realized it wasn’t rusted. It was a magnesium bike! I did some research that afternoon and found out it was a Pinarello Ak61 Magnesium Dogma—the kind of bike Lance Armstrong rode! There was a plastic tag in its tool bag with Armstrong’s name on it! I had “caught” the missing bike from Armstrong’s cheating scandal. I sold it for $125,000 to a film producer making a movie about Armstrong titled “Two-Wheeled Cheat.” Hiney was right—it wasn’t a fish but I had caught myself a dream.

What can I say? Who the heck was Hiney anyway? I’ll never know, but I’ve had my dentures replaced and will be headed to Woonsocket again this summer.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Epizeuxis

Posted on July 24, 2025 | Leave a comment

Epizeuxis: Repetition of the same word, with none between, for vehemence. Synonym for palilogia.

“Hell, hell, hell and more hell!” It was the story of my life. For as long as I can remember, nothing’s gone right. When I was two, my car seat flew out the car when my father took a curve too fast. To this day, nobody knows how the car door came open, but I think my blankie got caught in the door when my mother closed it after she loaded me in. Blankie kept the door from closing all the way. Also, my mother never buckled in my car seat. It was an accident waiting to happen. Whenever I asked her about the accident she would give me a thimbleful of gin and tell me to “Shut up and be grateful.” She did that until I was five. After that, she just hit me.

What was I supposed to be grateful for? My face had skidded across the pavement tearing off my lips, nose, and and eyebrows and leaving lines etched up and down my face like pin stripes.

I can’t afford to get my face fixed so I use Halloween wax lips and wear Groucho Marx eyebrow nose glasses. The lips make my speech incomprehensible. It’s a trade-off. The nose covers the two holes in the lump of flesh that used to be nose. The glasses are useless, but they make me look intelligent.

One of my goals in life is to have cosmetic surgery. I save every penny I can working at the car wash. I’m still trying to collect from Dad’s insurance company, but whenever I contact them, there is a mechanical voice that says “Negligence, negligence, negligence. You are ineligible to file a claim. Cease calling. Claim closed.”

Last week I tried to have a little fun. I went to the beach. I was trying to get a tan and my lips melted in the sun. They dripped down my chin. I was so embarrassed I ripped them off and peeled the wax off my chin. A woman walking by looked down at me and screamed at my lipless mouth. A crowd gathered around me. Some fat guy got in my face and said “We don’t like your kind around here.” I asked what my “kind” is. He said “Freak.” That did it. I put my backup paper bag over my head and ran to the bus stop in my bathing suit and flip-flops, leaving behind my blanket and cooler.

There. That’s just two examples of the hell of my life. There are hundreds more, but I don’t pity myself. One day I’ll be repaired and able to face whatever comes my way. Maybe somebody will love me.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Erotema

Posted on July 23, 2025 | Leave a comment

Erotema (e-ro-tem’-a): The rhetorical question. To affirm or deny a point strongly by asking it as a question. Generally, as Melanchthon has noted, the rhetorical question includes an emotional dimension, expressing wonder, indignation, sarcasm, etc.

“Who thinks this is going to go over well? Who is crazy enough to leave bomb in aisle 8?”

I was only a bag boy, but even I knew there was something wrong. Everyone ran out of the supermarket. Aisle 8 was stocked with nuts. The bomb planted there was fitting.

I stayed behind because I was too stupid to think I might be blown up—splattered on the floor and shelves.

The “bomb” was made out of a Planter’s Peanuts jar with an antenna sticking through the lid. It was filled with peanuts. I figured the bomb was buried in the peanuts. I thought if I picked it up and smashed it on the floor it would become harmless, or it might blow up. I yelled to the empty supermarket “What should I do?” A squeaky voice answered “You better get out of here!”

I looked up—it was Archie Stern, the smartest kid for a 200-mile radius. He had won awards—his rubber-band powered golf cart had just won the Arnold Palmer Golfing Equipment Innovation Award. Just yesterday, his Illegal Alien Detector had been adopted by ICE netting Archie millions of dollars. What could be his problem? Trying to sound tough, I asked: “Archie, what’s your beef?”

He held up a cellphone and yelled: “It isn’t a beef. It’s more like an annoying itch. I am trying to draw my mother in to aisle 8 so I can blow her up. She’s a gosh darn pain in the neck, pushing me. pushing me, always pushing me. She goes grocery shopping every day around this time. Soon, I’ll have here within range of my bomb.”

Just then, Archie’s mother came walking up the aisle carrying a bullhorn. Archie told me to get the heck out of there unless I wanted to be made into a stain. I took his advice and ran. As I ran past the cash registers I heard her, using the bullhorn, say “Archie, you idiot, you’re squandering your big beautiful future. Go home and start a new project. If you don’t give me the cellphone you’ll only have saltines for dinner. Give me the cellphone.”

I pictured her standing in front of him with her hand out when Archie detonated the bomb. When it exploded it blew off his mother’s head. Ironically, it landed in the produce section among the heads of lettuce. Archie became a large puddle with bones.

Even in death he was valorized as a genius. He had found a way to make peanuts explosive. A single peanut thrown at an ATM could blow it open.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Eucharistia

Posted on July 22, 2025 | Leave a comment

Eucharistia (eu-cha-ris’-ti-a): Giving thanks for a benefit received, sometimes adding one’s inability to repay.

“Thank-you so much for this gold USB cable. It is a fitting tribute to my work in AI and the impact it has had on the golf games of millions of middle aged men. There’s no way I can repay this honor. Thank-you.”

Some guy in the front row wearing a faded Pink Floyd T-shirt stood up and yelled “Bullshit!” The audience gasped and Security headed for him. I was thinking “How the hell did that miscreant make it to the front row?” as he was dragged up the aisle, into the lobby, and out the front door. At the last minute, I realized I he was my wife’s brother Rambo—a nickname he had given to himself. In all my years of marriage I never found out his real name—to me he was just Rambo.

Rambo didn’t like me solely because I went to college. For some reason he deeply resented my education. For example, one time when he was visiting, he took my Harvard diploma off of my office wall and peed on it in the back yard. He yelled “Hey shitstain, it’s raining on your parade!” “Shocked” is too mild a word to describe how I felt.

I asked my wife Ruby what the hell was going on with him, aside from the obvious insanity, there had to be a backstory. She told me that Rambo went in the Army solely for the GI Bill’s educational benefits. He went to war and was awarded a Purple Heart for combat wounds and a Bronze Star with a “V” for valor. Along with the medals came PTSD. For some reason, the squishing sound of a marker on a whiteboard would trigger him. He would mimic talking on a AN/PRC-148 radio and say “Tractor Goat, this is Inkblot, I need a pepperoni pizza at the following grid coordinates, I kak . . .”

His uncontrollable actions were deemed disruptive and he was booted from the community college. Hearing the story from Ruby, I wanted to help him. I completed college on the GI Bill and knew where he was coming from—I had my fair share of problems related to my service and the VA had helped me. I got Rambo to go to the VA for his PTSD. Now, he has coping strategies and the community college has accommodated him, using chalkboards instead of whiteboards in the classes he takes.

Rambo has started calling himself Billy—the name his parents gave him.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Euche

Posted on July 21, 2025 | Leave a comment

Euche (yoo’-kay): A vow to keep a promise.

“I swear—I promise to love you forever. Through thick and thin, IRS audits, and everything.”It was the most all-encompassing promise I had ever made. I’m pretty sure I meant it when I made it to her on the futon in the cargo space of my brand-new Subaru Outback. We were parked down an old logging road that my Subaru readily traversed. The road was remote and it was certain our activities would go undetected. Viva Subaru and the privacy it afforded by its four-wheel drive.

Even though I had made a promise of undying love, about two weeks later my feelings had started to wane. I was losing even feelings of friendship toward my girlfriend, especially when she made fun of my mother. My mother weighed 300 pounds and was five foot five. She sat in her chair all day fanning herself with the folding fan I had gotten her on a school trip to Chinatown ten years ago. She loved jellybeans and kept three bags full on the end table by her chair. She had a minder named Sal who dressed in all-white like a Good Humor man or a hospital orderly. He read her stories, shopped for groceries, fed her, did magic tricks, and helped her mount her walker when she had to go to the bathroom, take a shower, go or to bed. He also drove her to her numerous doctor’s appointments.

My mother had a speech impediment called rhotacism—a difficulty pronouncing the letter “R.” It embarrassed her to no end. For example, when she would say “wootabega” instead of “rutabaga” she would actually apologize.

My girlfriend Merdella made fun of my mother. Even though I had promised to love her forever, her making fun of my mother’s speech impediment made a huge blot on our relationship. When she said “Don’t forget to weaw a wubber!” when we were about to do it, I lost my desire and drove her home from the swamp where we were parked. She kept mimicking my mother and it was driving me crazy.

Then, I realized she was suffering from rhotacism just like my mother! Now, it was like our relationship was meant to be. When I listened to Merdella and my mother converse it was like a duet of love songs—my Ma’s and my future wife’s.

Then one day Merdella told me she had gotten “fresh raspberries” at the grocery store. She blushed and said “I mean fwesh wasbewies.” She had been faking it all along! I asked her why. She told me she wanted to win my love by being like my mother. I thought that was creepy, but I thought as long as she keeps the ruse going when we’re around my mother, it’s ok with me, especially if it smooths things with my mother who was about to marry Sal and move to Florida.

Life is complicated. You never know how things will work out, especially with womance which is totally unpweedictable.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Eulogia

Posted on July 20, 2025 | Leave a comment

Eulogia (eu-lo’-gi-a): Pronouncing a blessing for the goodness in a person.

She hit me again with her hickory stick. I said “God bless you.” I was at “Madame Hurty Butt’s,” the most popular house of pain in New York City. For only $200 per hour, I could get my cheeks striped red and revel in the guilt the stick beat out of me. Afterward, I reveled in the burning pain of sitting down as a nearly spiritual echo of my well-deserved punishment.

My “Retributer” Miss Mortify would give me an extra 10 minutes of caning free of charge if I peed in my pants. I never missed. I brought a clean pair of underpants and jeans to change into and got my extra 10 minutes every time. I was on the top of the world but being on the bottom!

Then, my wife started asking questions. After all those years, she noticed I winced when I sat down for dinner. Then one night when I left the lights on when I came to bed, she saw the red stripes on my butt. Of course, she asked me what the hell was going on. I decided it was best to tell her.

When I was nine I had a pet box turtle named Trudgy. Trudgy was on my bedroom floor. Innocent Trudgy. I was jumping back and forth over him. I thought it was funny how he moved his eyes around. Then, he retracted into his shell. I got mad and stamped my foot on him and crushed his shell and killed him. I ran and got my shovel and pail out of my sandbox, scraped him off the floor, and shoveled him into my pail. I took him downstairs, dumped him the garbage and rinsed out the pail. Then, I cleaned the spot on the carpet and didn’t say a word about what had happened. But, from that day forward I’ve had a burning in the pit of my stomach that only caning can assuage.

I discovered the ameliorating influence of caning in the sixth grade when Miss Merryweather would discipline me after school for infractions during class. I started being bad so I could have my daily lessons and forget Trugdy’s murder for awhile. Then, when I was in the seventh grade, I got an after school job at a movie theatre. My boss was horrible—she kept pointing out all the “bad” things I did and giving me the kind of punishment I needed—cane with pants down. When I turned 18, I started going to “Madame Hurty Butt’s” and I’ve been happy ever since.

My wife told me I qualified as a genuine pervert. She told me she had been experimenting with different modes of stimulation and would like to try “red-striping” my butt herself instead of me paying $200 per hour.

We tried it. Her wrist action is phenomenal!

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Eustathia

Posted on July 19, 2025 | Leave a comment

Eustathia (yoos-tay’-thi-a): Promising constancy in purpose and affection.

“I love you more than BLTs.” Everybody can relate to that! Who doesn’t love BLTs? People with no taste buds? Unfortunately, I had failed all these months to realize she was a vegetarian! All the carrots. All the rice. All the cheese. All the humus. Etc., etc. I should’ve realized.

She spit on ground—yes, spit on the ground! And said, “You toad. I can’t believe you think I have BLTs on my radar screen as similes of love—actually, a BLT is a bearer of two hapless vegetables poisoned by nitrite-laced pig meat—MEAT—you idiot—MEAT!”

I told her I was sorry. I hadn’t realized she was a vegetarian. She hadn’t told me and all the delicious food we were eating never seemed specifically vegetarian. It just seemed like good food. This softened her up. I was relieved when she stepped close to me and handed me an avocado. I was vindicated. In fact, I had become a vegetarian without knowing it.

Unfortunately, I still had a taste for meat. I satisfied it with cold cuts, primarily mortadella, and occasionally, bratwurst. I lived in fear of being caught, but I loved her and needed her in my life. One day she said she thought I had meat on breath. I started eating breath mints to cover up the smell. I told her I wanted to be ready to kiss her all the time. She thought that was romantic.

Then, it all fell apart. Foolishly, I had given her a key to my apartment. One day she came over unexpectedly. She walked into the kitchen and saw me with a slice of mortadella hanging about of my mouth. I was caught!

She tore the mortadella out of my mouth and threw it on the kitchen floor and ground it into the tile with her foot. She pulled a rutabaga out of her purse and started beating me over the head and yelling “Meat traitor!” and “Pig swallower!” I just stood there and took it. I deserved it. I said, “I don’t care what you think, I will love you forever, through the planting and harvesting of vegetables of hope, with no pesticides.”

She stopped beating me. She put some water on to boil, sliced up the rutabaga and put in the pan to boil. She said, “Honey, we can do this. As long as you don’t eat your mortadella in front of me and keep eating the mints we can be a couple forever. I will love you like an ear of corn heavily salted and soaked in butter. Our love will be an eternal harvest of joy.”

I was shocked by her turnaround, but love works in mysterious ways. When she wasn’t looking, I pulled a slice of mortadella out of the package on the counter, took it into the living room, and gobbled it down, followed by a breath mint.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Eutrepismus

Posted on July 18, 2025 | Leave a comment

Eutrepismus (eu-tre-pis’-mus): Numbering and ordering the parts under consideration. A figure of division, and of ordering.

First, I put on my pants. Second, I put on my socks. Third, I put on my t-shirt. Fourth, I . . . dammit I forgot to put on my underpants. They should’ve been number one, before my pants. Now, I had to start over. I was glad I hadn’t put on my shoes yet! They’re usually number four, before my wristwatch and coat.

I pulled off my pants, then my socks, then my t-shirt. Then, I started over. It was getting a little late, dawn was breaking, and I was hoping I’d make it to the duel on time. So, first I put on my underpants. Second, I put on my pants. Third, I put on my socks. Fourth, I put on my T-shirt. Fifth, I put on my shoes. Sixth, I put on my wristwatch. Seventh, I put on my jacket. Eighth, I put on my Kevlar vest over my jacket, just in case.

The duel was scheduled to take place at the county landfill. If somebody was killed, they could just be rolled onto the mountain of garbage and forgotten about.

“Duels” were unheard of in the 21st century, but I had crossed paths with the wrong person. He had a permanent role off Broadway in “Gone With the Pies.” He played an 18th-century pie delivery man who steals pies to save his starving family. He is caught and hanged without a trial, and consequently, the benefit of an attorney. His dying words were “The apple pie was best.” A fitting taunt for a pie thief.

He had played the role for so long, he had affected an 18-century demeanor. Hence, the duel. I had made the mistake of telling him I thought his daughter Nell was “hot.” He hit me in the face with a slice of apple pie and challenged me to a duel for his daughter’s honor. I was so shocked I just said, “Whatever.”

Nobody was going to be killed—I don’t know what the landfill thing was about. We were going to hurl pies at each other. We were back to back with our pies hoisted high. We were to take five steps, turn, and hurl. I turned. He was pointing a small handgun at me—clearly .22 caliber. He fired once and hit my pie. He fired again and hit my Kevlar vest. He yelled “You ruddy blighter!” and threw the gun on the ground, and ran into the rising sun taking a bite out of his pie.

He was clearly operating over the rainbow. The man was nuts. I never should’ve gone along with him. I thought it was some kind of joke, but it wasn’t. I didn’t press charges for attempted murder on the condition he let me date his daughter. He said I could marry her if I wanted to.

“Gone With the Pies” is still running off Broadway. I’ll be marrying Nell in two weeks. After I told her about the thing with her father, she got “HOT” tattooed on her lower back.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Exergasia

Posted on July 17, 2025 | Leave a comment

Exergasia (ex-er-ga’-si-a): Repetition of the same idea, changing either its words, its delivery, or the general treatment it is given. A method for amplification, variation, and explanation. As such, exergasia compares to the progymnasmata exercises (rudimentary exercises intended to prepare students of rhetoric for the creation and performance of complete practice orations).

I’m happy. I’m elated. I’m joyful. I’m on cloud nine! I found my sock that I lost two years ago. By weird circumstances, it ended up on the roof of my house, stuck in the gutter’s downspout. I found it when I was cleaning the downspout. Over the years, the sock had started to clog it.

I was baffled. How could I not remember how this had happened—how my sock ended up on the roof? It’s so crazy that it ought to stick out in my mind, but it doesn’t.

I did remember hanging the pair of socks on the clothesline. I even remember using my new wooden clothespins—they still had their spring and attached my laundry tightly to the clothesline—nothing could have blown off or fallen off.

The sock mystery needed to be solved. My life was stalled in the murk of the mystery. It was a bad feeling arresting my life’s progress.

There was a doctor who recently moved into town. He specialized in memory retrieval. “Unconscious memories need to retrieved,” he said “because they act as concealed motives making us do things for reasons we’re not aware of. When we retrieve the memories, we retrieve our free will and act in accord with conscious wishes.” In my case, I had purchased hundreds of pairs of socks, not knowing why. My basement was filled with unopened boxes of white athletic socks.

I made an appointment at “Memory Lane.” Dr. Cache gave me a complimentary cup of tea and blindfolded me with a white athletic sock. He kept tightening it around my head while he yelled “Remember, remember, remember.” Suddenly something snapped in my head and I was back in my yard hanging my laundry two years ago. I turned to hang my underpants, but in my revery I could see behind me—I could see my socks dangling there, fluttering in the soft springtime breeze. Suddenly, a Canada goose swept down and grabbed one of my socks. As it flew over my house it collided with a large crow and dropped the sock on the roof of my house and it slid out of sight into the gutter. I saw it! It was birds that did it when my back was turned! Clearly, it was nesting season and the Canada goose grabbed the sock to weave into its nest.

I thanked Dr. Cache. Driving home, a Canada goose flew alongside my SUV. He had a sock hanging from his bill. At that point I realized the tea Dr. Cache gave me may have been drugged. When I pulled into my driveway, the goose dropped the sock on the roof of my house. I climbed up on the roof and retrieved the sock. I looked inside and there was a note. It was from Dr. Cache! It said “Try to forget this!”

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Exouthenismos

Posted on July 16, 2025 | Leave a comment

Exouthenismos (ex-ou-then-is’-mos): An expression of contempt.

“I hate your guts.” As soon as I said it I realized it missed the mark by miles. Who wouldn’t hate guts.? Slimy, bloody, stinky guts are totally hate-worthy no matter whose guts they are. The truth is I just plain hate guts—anybody’s guts, no person’s guts in particular. All guts.

My mind was reeling. I was still in the hate moment and had to tell Charlene in a memorable, hurtful, way how I felt about her. I sad “I hate you” as a filler while I conjured something more wicked. She complied by sobbing uncontrollably, rending her garments and pulling out her hair. I was amazed at the work “I hate you” could do at ruining a person’s life. The emotional damage was evident. I had to call 911 and have Charlene resuscitated from the violence of her sobbing.

Although I didn’t want to, I rode in the ambulance with her to the hospital. She had rended her garments to a fairly great extent. The EMT couldn’t take his eyes off her. Maybe he looked at everybody that way—like he was looking at Thanksgiving Dinner laid out on a table. I almost gave him Charlene’s phone number, but decided against it because I was feeling like I liked her again. I didn’t know what I was going to do next.

When she woke up, I told her I liked her again, that all was well, I no longer hated her. She was a little bald from the hair pulling, but in some ways it was an improvement over her previous hairstyle. She smiled and motioned me to her bedside, pulled out her IV, and stuck it in my eye when I bent to kiss her.

I’m blind in my left eye now. Charlene was convicted of assault and is serving a one year sentence at a minimum security prison. I visit her once a month and she refuses to see me. I’m trying to get a new girlfriend, but it’s hard when you’re blind in one eye and they ask you how it happened. I stopped telling the truth. Now, I tell people it happened during a tornado when a wood sliver stuck in my eye when I was rescuing my neighbor’s dog, Tuffo.

I’ve actually gotten a couple of return dates on the strength of the tornado story. Lying works.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Expeditio

Posted on July 15, 2025 | Leave a comment

Expeditio (ex-pe-di’-ti-o): After enumerating all possibilities by which something could have occurred, the speaker eliminates all but one (=apophasis). Although the Ad Herennium author lists expeditio as a figure, it is more properly considered a method of argument [and pattern of organization] (sometimes known as the “Method of Residues” when employed in refutation), and “Elimination Order” when employed to organize a speech. [The reference to ‘method’ hearkens back to the Ramist connection between organizational patterns of discourses and organizational pattern of arguments]).


Was it a bird? A plane? A speeding locomotive? Was it my neighbor Ed running wild in his back yard wearing a spa towel?

It wasn’t a bird. It had no feathers and was firmly on the ground. It wasn’t a plane. It was firmly on the ground too and it had no propellers or jet engines. Speeding locomotive? Where the hell did I get that idea from? My thinking was scaring me, but I knew it came from my boyhood obsession with Superman—the caped crusader for truth, justice and the American way. Whenever I was unsure of what I was observing, I laid out the bird, plane, and speeding locomotive options. They brought me comfort, relaxing my mind and making it more likely I would draw a seemingly well-considered conclusion, even if it was wrong or insane, or worse.

In the case above, it was in fact Ed running wild in his back yard in his spa towel. He says the towel reminds him of his Scottish heritage—it’s like a kilt with an elastic waistband and Velcro closeure without any plaid. He got a number of different colors and wears them everywhere, even in the winter. It snows a lot where we live and he looks really crazy on snowshoes wearing a baby-blue spa towel trudging through the snow. I don’t know where his spa towel fetish comes from—definitely not his Scottish heritage—he’s of Italian lineage.

I think it started with him flashing the cleaning ladies when he was sitting by his swimming pool. He’d face his house with the towel on and spread his legs and jiggle his junk. The cleaners would stop their work to watch out the back window. Their supervisor admonished him and banned the spa towel. This really irked Ed, but he went along with the ban. Now, he wears the towel grocery shopping and has developed a technique that makes it looks like it got caught on the shopping cart and falls off on the floor. It works like a charm and he’s never been arrested for exposing himself. He’s working on a routine now where his dog Butch pulls off the towel when he’s walking him in the park. In a way Ed reminds me of Superman with his persistence and strength of character. It’s not good character, but it’s strong character.

Uh oh. There’s something coming up my driveway. Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a speeding locomotive? Or is it a Jehovah’s Witness? It wasn’t a bird. It had no feathers and was firmly on the ground. It wasn’t a plane. It was firmly on the ground too and it had no propellers or jet engines. Speeding locomotive? Where the hell did I get that idea from? It had to be a Jehovah’s Witness! The door bell rang. I hid in the basement and cleaned off my workbench, hoping he would go away. I went upstairs after about 10 minutes. There was pounding on my door. A voice said “I can see you.” Maybe it was Superman posing as a man of Christ, looking through my door with his X-ray vision. No. No way! Not Superman!

I called 911 and waited for the police to arrive.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Excusitatio

Posted on July 14, 2025 | Leave a comment

Exuscitatio (ex-us-ci-ta’-ti-o): Stirring others by one’s own vehement feeling (sometimes by means of a rhetorical question, and often for the sake of exciting anger).

How much longer are we going to let this go ? When are we finally going to do something? It has got to end! It has got to end NOW—RIGHT NOW!

The smell was horrendous. It might’ve been ok 50 years ago when this was all farmland. But it isn’t ok now that it’s suburbia—little White Houses where decent people live raising their pets and children, mowing their lawns and washing their SUVs in their driveways —barbecuing in their back yards and holding neighborhood garage sales.

There’s no place for a pig farm in this neighborhood. Oinking, pooping beasts covered with mud and eating clam bellies—yes clam bellies! The stench is so bad I can smell it inside my house with all the windows shut and the air-conditioning running.

Mr. Hobart has a truckload of bellies delivered from Boston each week. The truck arrives with a haze of flies following it. The bellies are dumped in the five kiddie pools in Mr. Hobart’s front yard.

Mr. Hobart’s family’s been raising pigs here since the late 1800s, but it’s not the late 1800s any more! It’s 2025 and we want the pigs the hell out of here now! The lawsuits have failed, but gunfire won’t. Tonight we shoot the pigs! Tonight we put an end to the clam belly stench and make Acorn Vista a better place to live—a better place for our pets and other loved ones. For our dogs and cats and fish and birds and sons and daughters!

POSTSCRIPT

Acorn Vista’s “fixers” were rounded up by Sheriff Hobart (Mr, Hobart’s grandson), jailed and fined $500 each for menacing. The problem persists and Mr. Hobart shows no sign of backing down.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Gnome

Posted on July 13, 2025 | Leave a comment

Gnome (nome or no’-mee): One of several terms describing short, pithy sayings. Others include adage, apothegm, maxim, paroemia, proverb, and sententia.

“When you think you know, you know what you think.” I’ve used this saying to keep me on track all my life. I learned this saying from a slip of paper I found in the gutter in Boulder, Colorado when I was sitting there waiting for the Hare Krishna guy to take me to dinner where I had to sing sing “Hare Krishna” until the rice and lentils were served, along with a glass of water. I had to clean pots and pans afterward, but the free food was keeping me alive. I was grateful, but not grateful enough to shave my head.

I was living under a plastic table cloth behind the “Doozy-Duds” laundramat. When it got cold I would spend my days inside the laundramat. That’s where I met Ba-Jeepers. She was a hard-core hippie chick who worked at the head shop “Starship” down the street. She had buttons all over her clothes emblazoned with sayings like “Save the Whales,” “Flower Power,” “Keep on Truckin’,” and “Groovy.” They had a button press at the head shop and she made a button with my saying on it. She wore it all the time and told me it brought her tranquility.

Then, one day she offered to wash my clothes. She loaned me a tube top and a granny skirt while she did my clothes. I had left my saying in my pocket and it was ruined in the wash. To make up from it she had me a button made at Starship that had my saying on it. I was grateful. My saying made me feel like Descartes: “I thought, therefore I thought.” I gave lectures in the Doozy Duds. The “Thinking Thoughts Theorem” caught on. The Doozy Duds clientele started talking in circles to stay intellectually afloat with no foundation outside of their thoughts to support their thinking about their thoughts.

The Hare Krishna people got wind of what I was doing. They did not like it. They threw rice bowls at me when I walked past their temple and refused to feed me rice and lentils ever again, unless I recanted. Now I knew how Descartes felt. I wouldn’t recant.

Ba-Jeepers started feeding me and let me stay with her. We fell in love. She came from a wealthy family. They gave us money and we opened a luncheonette named “Hairy Rabbit.” It was across the street from the Hare Krishna Temple. For some reason their hostility abated. I continued to give my lectures on “Thinking Thinking” on a little stage in Hairy Rabbit. With the advent of local access cable TV, I attracted 27 followers. Meanwhile, “Hairy Rabbit” was booming. People who were sick of all the vegetarian restaurants ate at Hairy Rabbit—and that was a lot of people.

Before we knew it, we had a daughter. We named her “Light” after our favorite color, light. We franchised Hairy Rabbit, and now they are all over the USA. As a tribute to my past, we have rice and lentils and a glass of water on the menu for free for homeless people who can prove they’re homeless.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Graecismus

Posted on July 12, 2025 | Leave a comment

Graecismus (gree-kis’-mus): Using Greek words, examples, or grammatical structures. Sometimes considered an affectation of erudition.

“Pathos is the boiling gale of what is αληθής blowing through the ψυχή. What could be better-founded in the soul—the home of truth—than the gale’s unrelenting admonition to believe. It blows away all preconceptions and teaches a new lesson on the wind—filling the ears and filling the head with a τυφώνας of experience erasing and replacing what went before. Memories are occluded. Hierarchies are dismantled and reconstructed in accord with the feelings commandeering your επιλογές and tossing you onto a new life course. You are transformed. You are a new person for better and for worse.”

I wrote this after I survived being run over by a garbage truck. I was trying to kill myself, but obviously I failed. After nearly a year in bed I was released from the hospital. My doctor told me to get a life and stop moping around like a “Boo-Hoo Bobby.” Just to get back at him, I had my name legally changed to Boo-Hoo Bobby. I had my last name changed to Dickweed. As Boo-Hoo Bobby Dickweed I expected to make my mark on the world. But it was more of a stain than a mark. In job interviews the interviewers would call me “Boo-Hoo” and start laughing. I couldn’t even get a job as a bag boy at Hannaford’s.

I learned how to play the guitar. I advertised myself as a Mississippi Delta blues singer. “Boo-Hoo” fit as a name for a blues singer—it was perfect. I covered John Lee Hooker, Robert Johnson, B.B. King, and Howlin’ Wolf. Then, given the shit my life had been, I started writing my own songs—experience taught me how to write songs with my feet firmly planted in hell. My song “Put Me Back in My Grave” was a massive worldwide hit followed by “You Drove a Spike in My Soul.”

The hits kept coming, but I was starting to lose the blues. Then, I wrote “Sunny Saturday” and it was a complete flop followed by “Sweet Smelling Flowers.” I had become optimistic. I had made millions, so I was able to retire in style. I went to Nashville looking for a wife.

I met a woman named “Puppet” in the hotel parking garage. She offered to cut my hair at her salon “Rocky Top.” I had no idea why she asked me, but she was beautiful so I agreed. She gave me a great trim and I proposed to her. She laughed at me and said no—no way. I could feel the blues coming on again!

I went up to my hotel room and wrote my biggest hit ever “You Cut My Hair and Killed My Dreams.” I was on the road again playin’ my guitar, whinin’ and tappin’ my foot; singin’ the blues.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Hendiadys

Posted on July 11, 2025 | Leave a comment

Hendiadys (hen-di’-a-dis): Expressing a single idea by two nouns [joined by a conjunction] instead of a noun and its qualifier. A method of amplification that adds force.

“Trials and tribulations.” The story of internal strife playing the extremes of being at once yearning and turning locked in the pathological embrace of desire and repulsion as a single point of emotion—two as one and singularly unnameable.

I was having another one of my fits. I was struck every few days by a feeling I couldn’t name or account for. The only thing wrong with my life was my fits. I would hide in my tool shed in my back yard expecting to be attacked by the large beaver living in the culvert under the entrance to my driveway. I do not know where the expectation came from.

I had named him “Bucky” after the toothpaste ad that was on TV. Bucky was a beaver with immaculate teeth. The implication was that he used the toothpaste. Most beaver’s teeth are bright orange. Bucky’s white teeth proved the toothpaste could cut through anything. When the ad came on I’d sing “Brusha, brusha, brusha” and clap my hands while Bucky waved around a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste. It was the highlight of my Saturday mornings

Despite my fear, I tried to make friends with Bucky but he backed into his culvert and growled and grunted and bared his horrible orange teeth. Sometimes he slapped his tail on the culvert’s bottom and splashed me with muddy water. That made me mad. He started doing it too often.

I decided to trap him and keep him in a cage. I could feed him the wood chips my dad used on the barbecue grill. I blocked off one end of the culvert with my bicycle. I got a jumbo Have-A-Hart trap at the hardware store. It was big enough to accommodate a wolf. I pulled it home on my wagon and loaded it with wood chips for bait. Bucky was too smart for the trap. He knocked over my bike at the other end of the culvert and took off. Now, he is a fugitive and now I know what causes my trials and tribulations.

At night I hear him slapping his tail on my bedroom door. I’ve caught him several times stalking me on my way to school. I carry a wood chip to cajole him to approach me and make friends, but he won’t. Last night my bed collapsed when I got in it. I looked and and saw that the legs had been gnawed beaver-style. Next, he might gnaw my legs beaver-style and leave me to bleed to death in my sleep. I had to kill him.

I would shoot him with the bolt-action .22 my father had given me for Christmas. I loaded the clip, put one round in the chamber and headed out for school. I would get him when he followed me. The School Crossing Guard told me to drop the gun and put up my hands. The next thing I knew I was arrested for carrying a firearm “on or near” school grounds.

Now, I meet with the school counselor Ms. Sanetino twice a week. She has told me that I am out of my mind, crazy, and around the bend. We talk mostly about her “piece of shit” husband and her lousy pay. But she did tell me, laughing, that I have beaver phobia and it will intensify as I get older.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Heterogenium

Posted on July 10, 2025 | Leave a comment

Heterogenium (he’-ter-o-gen-i-um): Avoiding an issue by changing the subject to something different. Sometimes considered a vice.

You want to know where I was all night last night? You keep asking me that question. What is it with you? You remind me of my mother. When I was in high school I’d stay out all night from time to time. I walk in the door at breakfast time and sit down at the kitchen table and ask her to make me scrambled eggs and sausage. She threw a glass of orange juice at me and hit me over the head with her iron skillet.

It knocked me out. She called 911 and an ambulance took me to the hospital. I was in a coma for a week and when I woke up I had a serious case of amnesia. I didn’t know where I was. I didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know anything. I was lost. I wandered around for five months. I spent a lot of time at the playground sliding down the sliding board over and over again. Then suddenly, when I was eating a slice of pizza, everything came back to me in a rush.

I actually remembered my name—Vinny—and my favorite baseball team and what my mother had done to me. It made me mad—real mad. I had been living on the edge of hell—a cipher without an identity or a purpose. I took the skillet out of the cupboard. I was going to bop my mother over the head so she would know what it was like to be a zombie. Then, I remembered.

When I stayed out all night, she never asked me where I was. I didn’t have to explain. She didn’t like that I stayed out, but she didn’t care where I was. That saved her from a skillet over the head.

Do you get my drift honey?

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Homoeopropophoron

Posted on July 9, 2025 | Leave a comment

Homoeopropophoron: Alliteration taken to an extreme where nearly every word in a sentence begins with the same consonant. Sometimes, simply a synonym for alliteration or paroemion [a stylistic vice].

“Dawdling dingos dig dinky dens.” I was raised in Sydney, Australia and my father drove this saying into my head like a nail. Beyond the saying he didn’t say much to me. He never said “G’day” or called me “Mate.” Once he said “It’s fair dinkum” and I had no idea what he was talking about.

He would disappear for years at a time and pretended he didn’t know who I was when he came back home. It was difficult. He told me to stay away from him because I was a stranger and he couldn’t trust me.

When I turned 22 I decided I was going to ban him from our home. My mother was all in favor of it. The last time he was home she found a picture of him in his wallet with a woman and six children—my half-brothers and half-sisters to be sure. She was heartbroken at first, and then, became furious. She wanted to stake him to the ground in the outback and let him die of hunger or thirst. I calmed her down with the banning plan. Eight months later he came home.

When he walked through the door, mom hit him in the face with my cricket bat. His nose started bleeding and he sobbed “Crikey! What did I do to deserve this?” It was the longest sentence I could ever remember he said. Mom had taken a picture of the picture she had found and shoved it in his face. “This!” She yelled and hit him again.

“Oh that!” He said, “That’s my sister and her kids. I visit them whenever I’m “out there.” “Liar!” Mom hit him again. He asked for $10.00 before we pushed him out the door.

He pitched a tent in our back yard. Since he was technically the owner of the property, he could do what he wanted. He ran illegal poker games in the tent. He’d be up all night drinking beer and dealing cards. It was noisy and upsetting for Mom. She tried to get him kicked off the property, but instead, he got us kicked out of the house. After all, he owned it.

Luckily I have my job at the Vegemite factory. I’m a pungency tester, assuring that the odor is robust enough to meet Vegemite standards. Mom sells homemade hot jam donuts outside the Opera House. Together, we do ok. We live in a nice apartment in Bondi.

We are bitter about what Dad did to us. We will probably murder him someday.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Homoioptoton

Posted on July 8, 2025 | Leave a comment

Homoioptoton (ho-mee-op-to’-ton): The repetition of similar case endings in adjacent words or in words in parallel position.

Note: Since this figure only works with inflected languages, it has often been conflated with homoioteleuton and (at least in English) has sometimes become equivalent to simple rhyme: “To no avail, I ate a snail.”

I had applied for the job 3 months ago. I wanted to be a cod chucker at the local fish market. I had been a pitcher on my high school’s regional championship baseball team. I was 59-5 for my career. I figured I could unerringly pitch dead cod to customers and hit the mark every time. I could even throw knuckle- and curve-fish. It would be fun and I was sure to get a reputation and become famous in South Bristol.

My family had settled in South Bristol in 1698, fought in the Revolutionary War and built boats there since the late 1700s. We were planted and rooted, and buried all over the local cemetery.

The next day I got a text message from “Tuna Tails.” They wanted to interview me for the chucker job. Since I would be working closely with 4 other chuckers, they thought it was best that I take a test to see if I was the right kind of person to chuck “in harmony.” I was to show up the next morning at 6.00 a.m. Chuckers started early.

When I got there, there were 8 other people there to take the test. We went in a room one at a time and took the test orally from Mrs. Tail, the wife of the owner of the fish market. It was a personality test called “Briggs and Patton.” It sounded a lot like “Briggs and Stratton” the small-engine manufacturers that power everybody’s lawn mowers. The questions were unusual. For example:

1. The chucker next to you squeezes your ass. What do you do?

2. You chuck a cod and the chucker next you distracts you by tickling you under your arm. What do you do?

3.The chucker next to you grabs your cod and chucks it. What do you do?

4. The chucker next to you hits you in the back of the head with a cod. What do you do?

There were 200 questions like this. It took about an hour-and-a-half to complete the test. I did not get the job because I gave the same answer to all 200 questions: “Tell the boss.” They said I sounded like a whiny squealer and didn’t want their employees to come running to them every time a fellow employee bothered them.

After that, my dad bought the fish market and got rid of the Tails. Now they have a car wash with a lame name. It’s called “Spray Day.” We renamed the fish market “Sea Hunt” in memory of Lloyd Bridges.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Homoioteleuton

Posted on July 7, 2025 | Leave a comment

Homoioteleuton (ho-mee-o-te-loot’-on): Similarity of endings of adjacent or parallel words.

“Big, wig, pig.” This is what I said to myself every time I crossed paths with my boss. Out loud I said, “Good day sir, how’re the wife and daughter?” Every day he said “Fine Bascomb, fine. The wife’s home baking oatmeal cookies and the daughter’s at school.”

Then one day, he said, “I’ve had a setback Bascomb, a big setback. The wife’s dead and the daughter’s a fugitive. Seems she shot the wife and lit her on fire. I’ll miss those damn oatmeal cookies quite a bit.”

The Boss didn’t bat an eyelash, and didn’t seem torn up or angry. He just kept walking down the line checking out the lathes and eating what was probably the last oatmeal cookie his wife would ever bake. I was worried.

I had read in “Amateur Psychology” that people who are grief-stricken should take a break and travel somewhere new with no memories of the departed. The Boss was not doing that. He was coming to work as usual. I was afraid he was going to snap. He seemed pretty tightly wound anyway. He was the kind of guy who buttoned his top button even when he wasn’t wearing a necktie.

Then I heard sirens—police cars were approaching the plant. I heard a bullhorn say: “Please put down the gun and walk this way. You could be shot. Please put down the gun and calmly walk this way.” I heard two shots and somebody calling an ambulance. The ambulance came and took off with siren blaring. Boss came walking up the line. I asked him how he was doing and was about to ask him what the hell was going on. Before I had a chance, he said, “A little off balance today Bascomb. Just shot the daughter. I think I might’ve killed her—they took her away in an ambulance. She came here to finish the job, first the mother, now the father, lucky I was prepared.” I gave him my condolences and went and hid in the Janitor’s Closet after I noticed he was holding a .45.

The Plant was surrounded and the Boss dropped the gun and surrendered. Subsequently, from his jail cell he recommended that I be promoted to Boss. Instead, I was fired because he recommended me. Now, I work at a dog food factory. I monitor the dog biscuit ovens. The biscuits make me think of Boss’s late wife and her oatmeal cookies. He was a lucky man.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Horismus

Posted on July 6, 2025 | Leave a comment

Horismus (hor-is’-mus): Providing a clear, brief definition, especially by explaining differences between associated terms.

Llife is not death. Up is not down. At the same time, death is not life and down is not up, hut.”These are the kinds of things I said when I was on the high school football team. I had a burning inferno of desire to make my mark as Crystal Valley’s high school quarterback. I wanted to give the team something to think about when the center snapped the ball. It would distract the team and I would often fumble the snap leading to a turn-over that lost the game.

A few of my favorites were: “In the valley of the blind, the one-eyed man is king, hut,” “It’s down at the end of lonely street, it’s heartbreak hotel, hut,” “The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind, but.” These were mega-distractorators. After I said “hut” the team would sit down in a contemplative posture, pick a blade of grass, and stare at it. Before they could put it down, the opposing team would trample them, grab my fumble, and score.

Nobody ever caught on. I was working for Tony Squingili. He ran all North Jersey’s betting operations. Our high school football games were his biggest book. He made enough off them to spend winters in Florida at his bungalow on Bird Key in Sarasota. I made one grand per game and gave forty dollars to each team member. I kept the rest for myself.

Cheating as a lifestyle had been drummed into my head when I was a kid. My father was an accountant. I used to hang out when he met with his clients and “cheat,” “cheating,” “cheated,” and “cheater” were repeated over and over by my father. All the men he worked for drove Cadillacs. So, I thought anything with “cheat” in it was the road to success. So far, it was true. I cheated on tests. I cheated at cards. I cheated at dice. I cheated on my girlfriend. I cheated at hide and seek. I even managed to cheat at horseshoes and ping pong!

I went to law school and became a criminal defense attorney. Guess what? I specialized in cheaters. In my closing argument I’d use my quarterback trick to throw off juries, and it worked. My big problem was with wives. I had been divorced seven times due to cheating. It was a compulsion stemming from my work. I hired a wife-cheating minder to follow me around and make sure I didn’t cheat. I fell in love with her and cheated on my 8th wife, and got divorced. Now, I’m married to my minder as wife number nine. She even follows me into the men’s room, like I’m gonna’ have an affair while I’m taking a leak. But, we’ve been married for five years and have a little girl we nicknamed “Queenie.”

It’s inconvenient, but having my wife as my cheating minder works. I’m am grateful.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Hypallage

Posted on July 5, 2025 | Leave a comment

Hypallage (hy-pal’-la-ge): Shifting the application of words. Mixing the order of which words should correspond with which others. Also, sometimes, a synonym for metonymy (see Quintilian).

“To the barn I went.” This was a turn of phrase of the most delicate sort. For many exegetes it was like scraping chalk across a blackboard. I might say “Hence, to the barn go we.” These turns of phrase were so irksome to so many whose lives were tangled and enslaved to grammar and syntax, two elements of speech that spelled the ruin of many an otherwise creative man. Trapped in a canyon of solicitude respectfully, yea, even obediently, traversed in the same fashion, starting as a rut and ending as an abyss. It made a lackluster bottomless hole in the surface of meaning, with a smiley face as a lid keeping out the light and weather, the sun, and moon, and sky.

It has the breath of a canary in a cage, endlessly discerning death—endlessly perching on the corpse that’s melting in a the gaseous stench of circumstance, the determining factor in what we believe—what we wallow in, rolling around squid-like, tentacles stretching and winding in the slime of probability, what some consider an oasis free from the arthritis of truth—the stiff-jointed fist that pounds on your beliefs making a lop-sided circle of meaning.

From day one to the end, we are, I am, prodded linguistically to put this before that, canning the alphabet over and over again, and spilling it and recanning it by the same process to the same end: repetition is the soul of spelling—always, all the time spelled like this, over and over as long as the word may exist. After all, we want to make sense to each other so we can threaten each other, make alibis, lie, pervert the course of Justice, and the handful of good things that I can’t even name.

So, it’s a mess. And, no doubt, I’ve missed the mark here. I’m like my neighbor’s dog that barks every night for a half-hour for no reason and then mercifully shuts up. So, now I will shut up.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Hypozeuxis

Posted on July 4, 2025 | Leave a comment

Hypozeuxis (hyp-o-zook’-sis): Opposite of zeugma. Every clause has its own verb.

“I am a travellin’ man. I am a movin’ groover. I have a crankin’ motor for a soul.” This is what I said when I introduced myself. It usually scared people away. I was just being honest.

I was high-test hyperactive. I took medication, but I couldn’t sit still. I talked too fast. I fidgeted. Foot-tapping was my specialty. I played the guitar at social events and it would often conceal my hyperactivity, especially if I played the blues which demand foot-tapping. I hid out in “Baby Please Don’t Go,” and “Boom, Boom, Boom” Both afforded heavy and deeply hard foot-tapping. I even wrote a blues song:

I put the gravy on my bread,

And then I went to bed.

I thought about you.

And I wished I was dead.

Ow, ow, ow!

I’m goin’ to sleep.

Ow, ow, ow!

You’re a creep.

I’m not gonna’ weep.

I’m goin’ to sleep.

Ow, ow, ow!

I wrote this after my girlfriend left me and I had the blues. She said I was too twitchy and had a hard time looking at me because it made her nervous and afraid. She was afraid that my twitch would cause me to accidentally punch her, so she couldn’t get close to me. We never hugged. We never kissed. We never . . . Just guess.

But now I met a new girl. Her name is Wiggle. We’re both hyperactive. When we get together it’s like two full speed egg beaters making meringue. It is the best connection I’ve ever made with another human being. We know what makes each other “tic.” Ha, ha—too funny.

We went for a moonlight walk that turned out to be two days long. We had so much energy we walked until we were exhausted. We laid by the side of the road bicycle pumping our legs in the air. We told the man who picked us up that we wanted to go to a motel. He agreed. When we got to the “Night Fever Motel” he checked the three of us into one room. We were alarmed when he started to take off his pants. We told him we weren’t that kind of people. He took off his pants anyway and ran out the door. We hauled-ass out of the room and noticed his car was parked there with the keys in it. We stole his car and drove to a shopping mall and left it in the parking lot. My driving was terrible—I couldn’t drive in a straight line and I kept stomping and letting up on the gas pedal—we were getting whiplash.

We called an Uber (which is what we should’ve done in the first place) and it drove us to our doors. I miss Wiggle, but I think we should stay away from each other for a little while.

Ow, ow, ow!

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Hysterologia

Posted on July 3, 2025 | Leave a comment

Hysterologia (his-ter-o-lo’-gi-a): A form of hyperbaton or parenthesis in which one interposes a phrase between a preposition and its object. Also, a synonym for hysteron proteron.

“Under milk cartons.” I thought that was really funny—better than Dylan Thomas any day. I was writing a poem about the county landfill. I was going to title it “Under Friggin’ Garbage.” I wanted to celebrate the layers of despair that one may encounter when tossing off former prized possessions as they rot and rust, becoming inedible, or crossing into the useless zone only to be replaced by fresh fruits or vegetables or cars, or lawnmowers, or couches.

I cried as I thought of my baby carriage. Mommy strolled me around the block, to the park and the shopping mall, and church. It was a mobile island of delight. It made me trust my mother. It was a luxury stroller made by an affiliate of General Motors. I would suck on my ba-ba as I rolled along on warm summer days. When we went to the park I would throw my ba-ba at the swans and laugh diabolically.

I was only 3 years old. My mother would laugh diabolically with me. She would pick up my ba-ba and throw it back at me. It usually hit me in the head. It was made out of plastic so it didn’t hurt. Then my mother would say “It’s all over Teddy,” and push me toward the lake. We both laughed diabolically. She would stop when the wheels were submerged. I would clap my hands and yell “Poo-poo. Poo-poo.” We were a team.

When I was fifteen I took the wheels off my baby carriage—it had seen its day and it was time to repurpose it. I made the wheels into a Big Wheels skate board and was going to propel myself across the USA like Forest Gump. I had to develop a special technique to make it work. With four wheels it only went in a straight line, so I had to learn to step on the rear end so the front wheels would pop up and I could pivot and turn.

Then, one day my little sister jumped on the Big Wheels Skate Board and it and rolled down the driveway. She couldn’t stop and rolled in front of a garbage truck. She wasn’t killed, but she was seriously injured.

That’s when I learned to throw things away when their day had come. No more repurposing. No more sorrow. When I put something by the curb for the garbage truck, I feel unburdened, free of something that does not matter any more.

Now, I revel in the fresh and the new.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Hysteron Proteron

Posted on July 2, 2025 | Leave a comment

Hysteron Proteron (his’-ter-on pro’-ter-on): Disorder of time. (What should be first, isn’t.).

I had gotten lost again. I wasn’t functioning. I got on my bicycle and rode off. I said goodbye to my mother and stuffed my ham sandwich into the tool bag hanging from my bicycle’s seat. I would feed it to the ducks when I got to Bella Park somewhere beyond the city limits.

I knew something was wrong when I passed a large sign that said “New Jersey, The Garden State.” I had started out in New York, not far from Newburgh. I didn’t see any gardens. Maybe the sign was a joke. All I saw were mountains, rocks, trees, and a river. “Ha, ha. Very funny” I said to the sign. If I was in New Jersey, I was the most lost I’d ever been.

Then, I saw him. He was twisting a small tree branch around in his ear. He was wearing avocado green down puffer pants and a rainbow-colored sarape. His shoes really caught my eye. They had wings on them!

He looked pretty old.

I asked, “Is this really New Jersey?” He said, “Everybody asks that. You must be lost. So am I.” I took out my ham sandwich and started eating it. I said, I get lost all the time. Somebody always finds me and brings me home. My nickname is ‘Missing.’ I’ll just sit on that log over there and wait for somebody to find me.” The man started laughing. “It’s not going to happen. Once you enter New Jersey, you’re lost forever. This is not the New Jersey. It’s the New Jersey invented by Thomas Edison in the last days of his life—it was an anniversary gift for his wife. You end up here randomly when you don’t know where you’re going and you’re in or on a wheeled vehicle. Actually, there is a way out. You may have noticed that my shoes have wings.”

I was scared to death. I tried to get back into New York, but I couldn’t. It was like the border had become a trampoline turned on its side making me bounce off of New York every time I rushed it.

The man was wearing, in addition to all the other crazy stuff, an adult size baby backpack. He told me to climb in and he would take me home. “But you’re lost too,” I said. He told me he was just trying to create some kind of rapport with me so I would calm down. He was lying when he told me he was lost.

He pulled a hat out of his serape. It had wings! He strapped it under his chin. I climbed aboard the baby backpack. He looked down at his feet and yelled “Fly” and the wings on his shoes and hat started flapping. We slowly took off like a helicopter and then soared over fake New Jersey. We met with turbulence as we crossed into New York. My bike was tied by a piece of rope around the man’s waist. He had to be careful that it didn’t get it snagged on a tree or a tall building.

When we got to my house we landed gently. I untied my bike and rode it up the driveway. I thanked the man and he flew away.

Nobody believes this story. They tell me it’s bullshit and insane and not worth listening to. Even though I show them the feather I pulled from the man’s shoe, they look at it and say I pulled it from my pillow or one of my chickens.

My father knows an ornithologist at the college where he works. After weeks of begging my father finally took the feather to school and showed it to him.

He was shocked. Its description was identical to ancient descriptions of the feathers on Mercury’s sandals. He couldn’t confirm the connection to Mercury, but he said, given the feather, my story sounded like I may have met Mercury.

I keep the feather by my bed in a small leather-covered box. After my trip to fake New Jersey, I stopped getting lost.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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Inopinatum

Posted on July 1, 2025 | Leave a comment

Inopinatum (in-o-pi-na’-tum): The expression of one’s inability to believe or conceive of something; a type of faux wondering. As such, this kind of paradox is much like aporia and functions much like a rhetorical question or erotema. [A paradox is] a statement that is self-contradictory on the surface, yet seems to evoke a truth nonetheless [can include oxymoron].

“I can’t believe you ate the whole thing.” I was mimicking an old AlkaSeltzer commercial that was popular at the time. Actually, I could believe it, but as a figure of speech I “couldn’t believe it.”

Eddie “Oink-Oink“ Malone had just eaten his entire birthday cake. He had blown out the candles after we sang, pulled out the candles, and began stuffing the two-layered chocolate cake into his face like he was feeding it into a chipper. As you can tell from his nickname, “Oink-Oink” had a problem.

He would eat uncooked pork roll right out of the cloth covering. Once, he carved a hole in a watermelon big enough for his head, put it on his head, and spun it around like he was making a smoothie. With the seeds and everything, he was unsuccessful, but that didn’t stop him. He sliced the watermelon up and ate it, and two more, like a normal person.

Once he filled a watering can with baked beans, took the sprinkler-end off and drank them down. It was insane to watch—he made his signature oinking sound as he swallowed the beans, and then started farting almost nonstop as he finished them off. It was “disgustingly beautiful” to witness, especially with the watering can gimmick she used to deliver the food to his face.

I think his greatest food feat may have been the use of an electric paint sprayer to deliver pea soup to his open mouth. All the kids in the neighborhood gathered in his basement to watch for twenty-five cents each. I introduced him. “The amazing Oink-Oink will consume the pea soup in this paint sprayer as I squirt it in his face from five feet away.” My aim wasn’t perfect, but we pulled it off. The audience cheered and clapped its hands. They chanted “More, more, more!”

The very next day we were ready for another performance. We filled a bucket with tapioca pudding. Oink-Oink stuck his head in the bucket. His head got stuck and he nearly drowned. I got the bucket off his head just in time and he choked up a stream of tapioca all over the floor. Our audience panicked and ran away. That was the end of it.

Oink-Oink was diagnosed with an eating disorder. By the time he was 18 he weighed 350lbs. He wrote a book “When I Die Bury Me In Lasagna” and toured the U.S. giving lectures on how to cope. He would often end a lecture by spraying his audience with hot pea soup.

He made millions of dollars and died of heart failure at the age of 49, leaving behind his wife Petunia, and his triplets, Ham, Pua, and Wilbur.

Definitions courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).

The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.

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