nullibiety
n. the state of being nowhere

A merchant who traded in cocoa
Much admired that strange style called rococo.
You’ll be happy to learn
That the name of his firm
Is to be The Rococo Cocoa Co.

— Leigh Mercer

In 1979, the California Court of Appeal reversed the conviction of a California man for possessing obscene films. Justice L. Thaxton Hanson wrote a long dissent implying that his colleagues favored pornography. In return, Justice Robert Thompson added a footnote to the majority opinion:

We feel compelled by the nature of the attack in the dissenting opinion to spell out a response:

1. Some answer is required to the dissent’s charge.
2. Certainly we do not endorse ‘victimless crime.’
3. How that question is involved escapes us.
4. Moreover, the constitutional issue is significant.
5. Ultimately it must be addressed in light of precedent.
6. Certainly the course of precedent is clear.
7. Knowing that, our result is compelled.

Read the first letter of each line.

John Peale Bishop (1892-1944) composed this acrostical poem, entitled “A Recollection”:

Famously she descended, her red hair
Unbound and bronzed by sea-reflections, caught
Crinkled with sea-pearls. The fine slender taut
Knees that let down her feet upon the air,

Young breasts, slim flanks and golden quarries were
Odder than when the young distraught
Unknown Venetian, painting her portrait, thought
He’d not imagined what he painted there.

And I too commerced with that golden cloud:
Lipped her delicious hands and had my ease
Faring fantastically, perversely proud.

All loveliness demands our courtesies.
Since she was dead I praised her as I could
Silently, among the Barberini bees.

I haven’t been able to learn anything more about it.

philogyny
n. love of women

mulierose
adj. fond of women

threpterophilia
n. love of female nurses

lingible
adj. meant to be licked

Founded by Daniel Dennett, the Philosophical Lexicon converts philosophers’ surnames into useful words (with often pointed definitions):

• bergson, n. A mountain of sound, a “buzzing, blooming confusion.”
• braithwaite, n. The interval of time between two books. “His second book followed his first after a long braithwaite.”
• chomsky, adj. Said of a theory that draws extravagant metaphysical implications from scientifically established facts.
• derrida, n. A sequence of signs that fails to signify anything beyond itself. From a old French nonsense refrain: “Hey nonny derrida, nonny nonny derrida falala.”
• foucault, n. A howler, an insane mistake. “I’m afraid I’ve committed an egregious foucault.”
• heidegger, n. A ponderous device for boring through thick layers of substance. “It’s buried so deep we’ll have to use a heidegger.”
• hughmellorate, v. To humiliate at a seminar.
• kripke, adj. Not understood, but considered brilliant. “I hate to admit it, but I found his remarks quite kripke.”
• rand, n. An angry tirade occasioned by mistaking philosophical disagreement for a personal attack and/or evidence of unspeakable moral corruption.
• turing, v. To travel from one point to another in simple, discrete steps, without actually knowing where one is going, or why.
• voltaire, n. A unit of enlightenment.

And, inevitably, dennett: “To while away the hours defining surnames.”

In November 2003, Word Ways: The Journal of Recreational Linguistics challenged its readers to discover why Ed Wolpow had sent in the following poem:

ADIRONDACK SHINGLES

Among old and crafty mountain men,
Far gone in their heart-held dreaming,
Nearest neighbor one mile down a rock road,
Busy poking old and peeling car bonnets,
An owl hoots past a tin ear.
The sunny period in every week
Is time for one–one hoarse chuckle.
It’s not the place for foxy generals
Nor a spiffy consul, furtive, medalled.
No young and flaxen onlookers
With peach fuzz included.
Extant alumni of a meaner university
Plead for simple knots and bolts.
Home to fossil icons of steep hills,
And not fossil verses which gleam
With glib phrases that parse nicely,
A rogue element in every line.

The answer is that each line contains the name of an element.