Gallimaufry: A History
…a jumble, a hodgepodge, from Old French galler (to make merry)
and Middle Dutch moffelen (to open one’s mouth wide)
7th grade (& 8th) the fave was gossamer—
Awkward, given that all I wrote were sermons
on Man’s Inhumanity to Man.
College thru 35: gather—
gathering my hair into a bun,
gathering my long skirts,
tucking them into the waistband
to climb something rocky,
lifting them for boys I gathered in. Gathering
books, husband, daughters, house.
Skin and flesh then.
I’d started writing about angels
all the time. The world is made of wings. I swear.
Throckmorton (though it’s proper). Ditto Fotheringay.
Farthingale, namaste, kerfuffle, clusterfuck,
pumpkin, Munchkin, snog.
Muzzy learnt from Stevens. Gaudy from Sayers.
Fuck and shit, my mother (bless her tongue).
Useless, except I love to spit it out, Yoknapatawpha.
Faulkner visited my grandfather once.
Elevenses from Tolkein. Downeast from Bert&I.
Etherized from Eliot. Ken and keen (for lamentation, not wit)
from something Irish. Merkin from Snodgrass.
Transubstantiate from Lehrer.
Newly: thrawn for what is crooked, contrary,
misshapen, perverse. Got looking something else up.
Experience: gallimaufry.
Address: ball of tied-together scraps of yarn.
Skills: gallimaufry
Award: a muffler made of tied-together scraps of yarn.
- Devon Miller-Duggan