S is for smutty soot, lungs-replete,
M’s for murky miasma—no treat,
O’s for olfactory obstructions that may be your fate,
G’s for grit galore forcing you to the pharma store

where anodynes can be secured,
unless you’re extremely poor.

SMOG is something that will lung-clog you,
SMOG turns the firmament gray from blue,
SMOG is partly foggin’ that’s enveloping your noggin.
“Smoke” is added to the brew.

S for semantic stitching we do,
M’s for “manteau”. . .maunder, me, askew?
O’s for orthography, one organizational tool,
G’s for grafting graphemes, in “manteau” tacked on to “porte,”
assumed on English-speaking shores.

This trend started with William’s* court.

SMOG: phoneme farrago, ’ffixing two
parts of words to form a term that’s new.
Frogs gave us this linguistic bijoux.**
Portmanteau was thus cobbled.

SMOG passes portmanteau test.
Of these words, there’s quite a few
like “motel” and frankenfood,”
“mathlete,” “spork,” AKA “foon.”
Smoke and fog make SMOG, the gloom
darkening the afternoon.

For what I have just been doin’. . .
create a portmanteau, “goune”—
Looks Dutch, but a [homo]phone of “goon”. . .
blend of “godawful” and “tune.”


*The Conqueror
**jewel