Prayer to Laughter

While working on my Poetry Anthology, I came across a poem, that for some reason i fell in LOVE with. Its just a simple little poem, but I dont know why.. it realllllly appeals to me. It makes me snicker. I shared it with my parents, and brothers as well.

PRAYER TO LAUGHTER by John Agard

O Laughter
giver of relaxed mouths

you who rule our belly with tickles
you who come when not called
you who can embarass us at times

send us stitches in our sides
shake us till the water reaches our eyes
buckle our knees till we cannot stand

we whose faces are grim and shattered
we whose hearts are no longer hearty
O Laughter we beg you

crack us up
crack us up

I think its so amazing how someone can chose a simple topic like "laughter" and create a piece using it, just by playing around with interesting words that connect to the original topic. I wish I could have used this piece for my anthology but it didnt relate to my original theme. I espeically love the choice of words in this poem. Anyone can choose random words to make a poem about laughter. But, for example, the sentence "you who rule our belly with tickles". What made him choose the word "rule" rather than something like... "give our belly tickles"... or something along the lines of that. The writer of this poem used very good poetic devices. Though there is no rhyming, it is still very affective.

This poem was from the book "Classic Poems to Read Aloud", selected by James Berry. This book has a very unique taste of different poems and I found it very useful for my anthology, but also a good read for when I am bored.