My blogging friend David Miller of  https://millerswindmill.wordpress.com/ sent me this amazing poem that highlights the problems of learning how to pronounce words in English. It is a wonder that anyone is able to master it as a foreign language, and that’s even before you add regional accents into the mix. It is very long, but I hope you enjoy it.

The Chaos (by G. Nolst Trenité, a.k.a. “Charivarius”; 1870 – 1946)

Dearest creature in creation
Studying English pronunciation,

I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse and worse

I will keep you, Susy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.

Tear in eye your dress you’ll tear,
So shall I! Oh, hear my prayer,

Pray, console your loving poet,
Make my coat look new, dear, sew it!

Just compare heart, beard and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,

Sword and sward, retain and Britain.