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From: wrf@degas.berkeley.edu (W. Randolph Franklin)
Newsgroups: net.jokes
Subject: English pronunciation poem
Message-ID: <12789@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: Sat, 29-Mar-86 13:26:31 EST
Article-I.D.: ucbvax.12789
Posted: Sat Mar 29 13:26:31 1986
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Reply-To: wrf@degas.berkeley.edu.UUCP (W. Randolph Franklin)
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     ENGLISH IS TOUGH STUFF

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation,
I will teach you in my verse:
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heart glow dizzy;
Tear in eye, your dress will tear,
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sleeve,
Scenic, Arabic, pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific,
Tour, but our, and succour, four,
Gas and alas and Arkansas;
Sea, idea, guinea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria;
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean,
Neither does devour with clangour;
Soul but foul, and gaunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont; want, grand and grant;
Shoes, goes, does; now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger;
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, age.
Query does not rhyme with very,
Neither does fury sound like bury,
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth
Job, job, bosom, oath;
Though the difference seems little,
We say actual but victual;
Refer does not rhyme with "deafer"
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer;
Dull bull; and George, ate, late,
Mint, pint, senate and sedate,
Ear but earn and wear and tear,
Do not rhyme with "here" and "ere",
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew, Stephen;
Monkey, donkey, clerk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp; and cork and work;
Doctrine, turpentine, marine;
Compare alien with Italian;
Dandelion with battalion;
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, key, quay,
Pronunciation - think of Psyche!
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits.

(found in the Ottawa(Canada) Guardian,1970; attributed to NATO).

-----
Wm. Randolph Franklin, UC Berkeley,  
   Arpanet: wrf@Berkeley.EDU
   Papermail: Computer Science Div., 543 Evans, University of California,
         Berkeley CA, 94720, USA
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After June 1986:

   Net: wrf%RPI-MTS.Mailnet@MIT-Multics.ARPA or franklin@RPICS.CSNET
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   Telephone: (518) 266-6077