Wordbirds, 39

We’ve commenced our journey backward through Webster’s 3rd. I’m picking a word near the end of each entry for each letter—a word that interests me for some reason or a word I’d not ever known before—and surrounding it with a frayed coat of doggerel.

Words that flew into my life from Webster’s 3rd …

nympholepsy noun

1. A species of demoniac enthusiasm supposed by the ancients to seize one possessed or bewitched by a nymph

2. A frenzy of emotion (as for some unattainable ideal)

When nympholepsy seized him, he

Was overwhelmed with gaiety.

But when the passion didn’t pass

(Unlike the high from smoking grass),

He went so see a local shrink,

Who knew exactly what to think:

“You have,” he said, “a grievous case—

And wipe that smile right off your face!”

But he (his name was Anthony)

Could not comply: A symphony

Of pleasures playing in his mind

Continued keeping him inclined

To smile. And so the shrink just kicked

Him out. (From then on out he picked

Diseases far more tractable.)

And Anthony? His heart was full

(As was his mind) of passions so

Adhesive that they wouldn’t go.

So he remained a smiling dude—

No pleasure did that dude exclude!