Poem
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 heat grow dizzy.
Tear in
eye, your dress will tear.
So shall
I! Oh hear my prayer.
Just
compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and
diet, lord and word,
Sword and
sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the
latter, how it's written.)
Now I
surely will not plague you
With such
words as plaque and ague.
But be
careful how you speak:
Say break
and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven,
oven, how and low,
Script,
receipt, show, poem, and toe.
Hear me
say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter,
laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid,
measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles,
similes, and reviles;
Scholar,
vicar, and cigar,
Solar,
mica, war and far;
One,
anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen,
lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude,
German, wind and mind,
Scene,
Melpomene, mankind.
Billet
does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet,
wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and
flood are not like food,
Nor is
mould like should and would.
Viscous,
viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to
forward, to reward.
And your
pronunciation's OK
When you
correctly say croquet,
Rounded,
wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and
fiend, alive and live.
Ivy,
privy, famous; clamour
And
enamour rhyme with hammer.
River,
rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and
roll and some and home.
Stranger
does not rhyme with anger,
Neither
does devour with clangour.
Souls but
foul, haunt 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, gouge and gauge,
Marriage,
foliage, mirage, and age.
Query does
not rhyme with very,
Nor does
fury sound like bury.
Dost,
lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob,
bosom, transom, oath.
Though the
differences seem little,
We say
actual but victual.
Refer does
not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer
does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint,
pint, senate and sedate;
Dull,
bull, and George ate late.
Scenic,
Arabic, Pacific,
Science,
conscience, scientific.
Liberty,
library, heave and heaven,
Rachel,
ache, moustache, eleven.
We say
hallowed, but allowed,
People,
leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the
differences, moreover,
Between
mover, cover, clover;
Leeches,
breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice,
but police and lice;
Camel,
constable, unstable,
Principle,
disciple, label.
Petal,
panel, and canal,
Wait,
surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and
storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator,
spectator, mayor.
Tour, but
our and succour, four.
Gas, alas,
and Arkansas.
Sea, idea,
Korea, area,
Psalm,
Maria, but malaria.
Youth,
south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine,
turpentine, marine.
Compare
alien with Italian,
Dandelion
and battalion.
Sally with
ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I,
ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver,
but ever, fever,
Neither,
leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron,
granary, canary.
Crevice
and device and aerie.
Face, but
preface, not efface.
Phlegm,
phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but
target, gin, give, verging,
Ought,
out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but
earn and wear and tear
Do not
rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is
right, but so is even,
Hyphen,
roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey,
donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask,
grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
Pronunciation
-- think of Psyche!
Is a
paling stout and spikey?
Won't it
make you lose your wits,
Writing
groats and saying grits?
It's a
dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn
with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington
and Isle of Wight,
Housewife,
verdict and indict.
Finally,
which rhymes with enough --
Though,
through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough
has the sound of cup.
My advice
is don't give up!!!
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