You know those slips of tongues you sometimes have, where one syllable gets in the place of another, and before you know you have swapped two of them actually! Like when you want to tell someone that all they are spouting at you is a “pack of lies,” and what comes out of your mouth instead is “a lack of pies!” Sometimes, it makes it all better in the end. Anyway, these swappy-slipups have a name – spoonerisms. And today, I have some tips on how you can use spoonerisms in poetry and more about them in general.

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Poetic Sundays: A Spoonful of Verses With Spoonerisms in Poetry

🍽️ Introduction: What are Spoonerisms, Anyway?

A spoonerism is when the initial sounds or letters of two words in a phrase are accidentally (or playfully!) swapped. Named after Reverend William Archibald Spooner, who apparently was known to utter many of them, these slips of the tongue can be laugh-out-loud funny and surprisingly clever.

• Example: Saying “you hissed my mystery lecture” instead of “you missed my history lecture.” Or asking someone, “Have you read The Ring of the Lords?” or “The Salt in Our Fars?”
• These sound-swaps often result in humorous or nonsensical phrases—and they make fantastic poetic playthings!

🎭 Why Spoonerisms Belong in Poetry

Spoonerisms:

• Delight the ear with surprise and sound play.
• Spark laughter and curiosity.
• Challenge your brain and boost your creativity.
• Fit right into poetry’s love for alliteration, rhyme, and rhythm.

Whether you’re writing for fun, for class, or to entertain an audience, spoonerisms can bring wordplay to the next level.

🪄 Tips to Try Spoonerisms in Poetry

Use these steps to get your spoonerism-swirled verse on paper (or device!):

1. Start with a familiar phrase
   • Think idioms, clichés, or sayings: “better late than never”, “blessing in disguise”, “carrots and peas”, “apples and bananas”.
2. Swap the starting sounds
   • Try flipping just the first consonants:
     • “better late than never” → “netter bate than lever”
     • “blessing in disguise” → “dressing in blisguise”
     • “carrots and peas” → “parrots and keys”
     • “apples and bananas” → “bapples and ananas”
3. Say it out loud
   • Spoonerisms are sound-based! If it doesn’t make you chuckle (or at least blink and think), try a new combo. Note that it is normally nonsense words but sometimes you might luck out with other real words that change the meaning or still remain nonsensical, like with the “you hissed my mystery lecture” example earlier. Regardless, it is always bound to make one smile or pause.
4. Fit it into a line
   • Match the spoonerism with your poem’s rhythm and meter.
5. Don’t overdo it
   • One or two spoonerisms per short poem works well. Let the swapped words shine.

✍️ Spoonerisms in My Poetic Attempts

Here are a couple attempts using simple poetic forms:

I juggled some bapples and ananas with glee,
Till they rolled off the counter and landed on me!

A Noisy Lunch
I asked my kiddos as I packed their lunch,
“Want keys and parrots to munch?”
They laughed with a snort,
Said, “Only that sort!”
“Mix-ups like this can pack a punch!”
~ Vidya Tiru @ LadyInReadWrites

For Inspiration

Read Shel Silverstein’s Runny Babbit: A Billy Sook and/or Philip Ardagh’s Book of Howlers, Blunders and Random Mistakery. And you can watch this video of a spoonerized version of the timeless tale of Cinderella.

Recently

On My Blog and Home-front

Since my last scribblings:

• 5 Hidden Delights this Week: Creative Tools and Cool Discoveries
• 13 Lists of Now: A Playful Medley of Moments
• Say It Right: Powerful Words for Disability Pride Month
• Must-Read Books with Honorific Titles You’ll Love
• Books + Poses: Kids’ Yoga and Friendship Stories They Love
• In Retrospect Once More: On Reading, Memory, and Blogging
• A Literary Picnic Basket: Books, Snacks, Magic, and More
• Time flies…How it does…
• Sunday Scribblings #230: The Echo Verse: Like a Record, Baby

I missed one Sunday, just in case you wonder how I wrote so many posts in one week! Which brings me to what has been happening on the home-front. The past two weekends have been busy and rushed past me before I knew they had come.

My son helped build a wardrobe!! Seems like mix-ups are in the air—just like Spoonerisms!

Last week, I was expecting a wood-brown wardrobe with slat-like doors ordered online… but what arrived had me wondering if someone had spoonerized the product description before packing the box! Let’s just say—it was not what I ordered. I’m now the owner of a piece that will mark me as someone who decorates with furniture in completely different colors.

The twist? I didn’t realize the mix-up until my son and his friend had built about half of it in the garage. He hadn’t seen the product photo—he just knew it was a wardrobe.

When I contacted the website, they told me I’d have to repackage and return the item to get a refund. Totally not worth the hassle. I was hoping for at least a partial refund and a sincere apology for shipping me a white cupboard with a different door design.

Thankfully, the functionality is the same, and we can use it as planned. It’ll just… stand out a bit in our room of brown and black furniture. Now I know what a white elephant means, or well, a white wardrobe in this case!

Upcoming

On My Blog and Home-front

Hoping to post most days this week, and it is going to be a busy week again.

This Week’s Celebrations

The Literary and Close-to-it Celebrations

• Literary Birthdays this week: Ernest Hemingway, Sarah Waters, Tess Gallagher, and Michael Connelly on the 21st; S. E. Hinton and Akhil Sharma on the 22nd of July; Raymond Chandler and Mohsin Hamid on the 23rd; Alexandre Dumas and Zelda Fitzgerald on July 24th; Melissa Marr on the 25th of July; Aldous Huxley, George Bernard Shaw, and Carl Jung on the 26th; Bharati Mukherjee and Cassandra Clare on 27th July
• July 22nd is Spoonerism Day
• Then it is more talking fun with International Yada Yada Yada Day on the 23rd
• Followed by Hemingway Days 23rd through the 27th of July.
  

Foodie Celebrations

• The 21st is National Junk Food Day
• While July 22nd observed Penuche Fudge Day and Mango Day
• Next up is National Vanilla Ice Cream Day, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Day, and Sprinkles Day, so I might make dessert my meal on the 23rd!
• July 24th is National Tequila Day
• While the 25th celebrates food-lovers with Culinarians Day. It is also National Hot Fudge Sundae Day and National Wine and Cheese Day
• National Coffee Milkshake Day, National Bagelfest Day, and World Tofu Day follow on July 26th
• While a favorite dessert of mine gets its day on the 27th! It is National Creme Brulee Day!

Other Celebrations

• July 21st observes Global Hug Your Kids Day
• While the 22nd of July is World Brain Day and Casual Pi Day 
• Next up is National Parents’ Day on the 23rd
• Followed by International Self Care Day on the 24th, and National Tell An Old Joke Day. So you could do both by calling your favorite cousin (part of self-care is to connect with loved ones) and tell them an old joke you laughed over ages ago, for it is also National Cousins Day!
• July 25th observes Carousel Day, International Red Shoe Day, and being the last Friday of July, it is also National Get Gnarly Day.
• July 26th is National All or Nothing Day and One Voice Day.
• The 27th of July is National Love is Kind Day, Take Your Pants for a Walk Day, and well, also Barbie-in-a-Blender Day (not what you might expect though!). And I love listening to bagpipes, so will so on the 27th for it is also Bagpipe Appreciation Day. What about you?

Wrapping up my Sunday Scribblings

So dear reader, this was it for my Sunday Scribblings. I would love to hear your comments on my post(s), poetic Sunday section, and anything else. And which of these days do you plan to celebrate (or any other)?  Do you have a favorite spoonerism? Have you ever had a slip of tongue yourself and invented one maybe? Or deliberately used one in speech or writing? Share your thoughts below

Linking this to the Sunday Post over at the Caffeinated Reviewer and the Sunday Salon.

Linking up to the Ultimate Blog Challenge