ONE A DAY #19

The Poem a Day Challenge invites poets to pen something new every day during April. This offering for Day 19 is in rhyming couplets - a whole new psychedelic experience.

"Turn On, Tune In, Fall Off!"

Kids, are you well doped up?  Then I'll begin.

This guy called Hofman(*) thought he'd win

fame and fortune by researching LSD.

(Extract of Magic Mushrooms to you and me)

So he purified a small heap of the stuff -

about the size of a pinch of snuff -

- dissolved it in some freshly distilled water

and said "I wonder if I oughta

inject myself?  Forward Hofman! Only the brave

deserve a thorough going rave!"

He filled a syringe and plunged the needle in-

-to a patch of tender Hofman skin,

and pretty soon his lab began to jump about and swerve.

But Hofman kept his nerve.

Ever the scientist he wrote down all he felt and saw

including blundering through the door

that looked and felt  and smelt like treacle pud,

and turning somersaults. A colleague said "Not good!

I'd take you home to Mrs. Hofman

so you can sleep it off, Man.

But we're at war so cannot use  the car."

Hofman said "It isn't far!

So if you like

I'll take a backie on your bike."

He passed the ride with mind distorting sights,

spirals and spinning balls of coloured light

and big pink rabbits that hopped about the floor

making him happier than he'd ever felt before -
except he was sure the neighbour he knew best
was  in fact the Wicked Witch of the West.

Safely back home Mrs. Hofman said "Tut tut!

You're stoned again, you psychedelic nut!"

"True, but it's all recorded in these notes!

Look, dearest!" She read "Mushroom gets my votes."

in perfect mirror writing and upside down.

(When Hofman trips, he really goes to town.)

She shook her head and sadly turned away.

All this was long ago and far away . . .

Hop-heads still celebrate "Bicycle Day"(*) 

(*) Hofman worked for the Swiss drug firm Sandoz in Basle. He injected LSD on 19th April 1943. He reported the "trip" firstly as awful, but as he "came down"- sublime. He did ride home on the back of someone's bike, because car use was restricted during WW2.  Rumour has it that "Bicycle Day"originated in 1985 in the Northern University of Illinois to commemorate Hofman's "achievement"