Poetry doesn’t have to be all sad faces and crying in the rain. Sometimes the best poems make you laugh until your sides hurt! If you’ve got a pen and paper but no clue what to write about, I’ve got your back. Trust me, your friends will think you’re a comedy genius when you show them a poem about your stinky gym socks.
Want to be the funniest person at the next family party? Nothing says “look at me, I’m hilarious” like pulling out a poem about why cats are secretly plotting to take over the world. Keep reading for 30 ideas that will make your poetry so funny, even your grumpy uncle might crack a smile.
Funny Things to Write a Poem About
Need a good laugh? These poem ideas will get your creative juices flowing faster than a kid running to an ice cream truck. Let’s jump into these hilarious topics that will turn you into the Shakespeare of silly.
1. Your Pet’s Secret Life
What does your dog do when you’re not home? Does your cat host fancy tea parties or practice evil laughs in the mirror? Your furry friend has a whole hidden life you don’t know about.
From midnight kitchen raids to plotting neighborhood domination, pets have busy schedules we never see. Write about the wild adventures your pet might have while you’re sleeping or at work – bonus points if you include made-up conversations with the mailman or squirrels.
2. Stubbing Your Toe in the Dark
We’ve all done the midnight toe-stub dance. That awful moment when your pinky toe finds the corner of the coffee table and you try not to wake the whole house with your muffled screams.
Your poem could follow the five stages of toe grief: shock, pain, anger, hopping on one foot, and the final acceptance that furniture is out to get you. Add dramatic sound effects or compare the pain to silly things like being attacked by tiny invisible ninjas for extra laughs.
3. Phones That Die at Critical Moments
Your phone battery always seems to know the worst possible time to hit zero percent. Right before that important call or just as you’re about to take the perfect photo, the screen goes black.
Craft your poem around the desperate hunt for a charger or the sadness of being forced to talk to real humans while your phone revives. You could write from the phone’s point of view, explaining its evil plan to leave you stranded at the most inconvenient times.
4. Autocorrect Disasters
Nothing says “I’m professional” like sending your boss a message about the “big fart” instead of the “big part” you’ll play in the upcoming project. Autocorrect has no mercy and perfect comic timing.
Your poem could be a collection of real or made-up autocorrect fails, or the story of one particularly embarrassing message that can never be unsent. For extra fun, write the entire poem as if autocorrect kept changing your words to increasingly ridiculous alternatives.
5. The Epic Quest for the TV Remote
The remote control is the modern-day version of a magical disappearing object. One minute it’s there, the next it’s vanished into another dimension, usually when your favorite show is about to start.
Describe the increasingly desperate search through couch cushions, under furniture, and in places the remote could never logically be. Your poem could end with finding it in an obvious spot or discovering that the dog has been hiding it all along as revenge for not sharing your snacks.
6. The Office Microwave Criminal
Every workplace has that one person who heats up fish leftovers or burns popcorn in the shared microwave. Their food crimes stink up the entire floor and leave everyone holding their noses.
Your poem could be written as a detective story, trying to catch the culprit, or as an open letter begging them to stop. Include vivid descriptions of the smells that make even the strongest workers run for fresh air, and the passive-aggressive notes left on the microwave door.
7. Dad Jokes Gone Wild
Dad jokes are so bad they’re good. Those groan-worthy puns that make kids roll their eyes but secretly giggle have a special place in comedy.
Create a poem filled with the corniest dad jokes you can think of, or tell the story of a dad whose jokes are so powerful they cause physical reactions like epic eye-rolls or spontaneous hair loss. You could even write about a dad joke competition where the worst joke wins the grand prize.
8. The Shopping Cart With The Squeaky Wheel
It’s a law of nature: you will always get the shopping cart with one wheel that sounds like a dying whale. No matter how you push or pull, that high-pitched squeak follows you through every aisle.
Write about the stares from other shoppers as you try to control your musical cart. Your poem could include an imaginary conversation with the cart itself, begging it to be quiet while it refuses to cooperate. End with the sweet relief of finally escaping the store.
9. Trying to Take a Good Selfie
The struggle for the perfect selfie is real. Twenty-seven attempts later and you still look like you’re being held hostage or like you have seventeen chins.
Describe the weird angles, the arm cramps, and the bizarre faces you make trying to look “natural.” Your poem could list all the rejected photos or track one person’s increasingly desperate attempts to get just one usable profile picture before giving up entirely.
10. The Existential Crisis of a Sock Without Its Match
Where do all those missing socks go? One half of a perfectly good pair vanishes, leaving its partner alone and useless in your drawer.
Write from the perspective of the abandoned sock, wondering what happened to its mate and questioning its purpose in life. Your poem could follow the sock’s journey from hopeful waiting to acceptance of its new life as a dust rag or puppet.
11. Public Bathroom Horrors
Public bathrooms are a gold mine for comedy. From empty toilet paper rolls to mysterious puddles and the awkward silence when you realize someone’s in the next stall.
Your poem could be a guide to surviving these facilities or a dramatic retelling of a particularly traumatic bathroom experience. Include the universal bathroom truths we all understand but never discuss, like the panic when the lock doesn’t work or the disappointment of automatic paper towel dispensers.
12. The Art of Pretending to Work
We’ve all mastered looking busy while doing absolutely nothing. The strategic keyboard typing, the serious face while scrolling social media, and the purposeful walk to nowhere in particular.
Craft a step-by-step guide to looking productive or tell the story of someone who becomes so good at fake working they get promoted. Your poem could include close calls with the boss and the mental gymnastics needed to justify hours of watching cute animal videos.
13. Food That Looks Better on Instagram
That perfect avocado toast on social media never matches what you make at home. Food photos online are works of art, while your attempts look like sad piles of ingredients.
Write about the expectation versus reality of trying recipes you saw online. Your poem could compare the gorgeous, filtered photos to your kitchen disasters, or be told from the perspective of food that knows it’s not photogenic enough for your social media feed.
14. The War Against Fitted Sheets
Folding a fitted sheet is one of life’s greatest mysteries. No matter how many tutorial videos you watch, it still ends up looking like a lumpy ball in your linen closet.
Your poem could be an epic battle between human and sheet, with the sheet always winning. Detail the frustration, strange contortions, and eventual surrender as you stuff the uncooperative fabric wherever it will fit. End with the sad truth that even adults don’t know how to do this properly.
15. When Your Stomach Makes Weird Noises
Your stomach has perfect timing for embarrassing you. In quiet classrooms, important meetings, or first dates, it suddenly sounds like you’re hiding a angry whale in your shirt.
Describe the horror of trying to silence these mysterious sounds or explain them away. Your poem could include increasingly ridiculous excuses for the noises or be written from the perspective of your stomach, which seems to have a mind of its own and zero respect for social situations.
16. The Fake Laugh for Bad Jokes
We all have that polite laugh we use when someone tells a terrible joke. It’s not quite real but just convincing enough to spare their feelings.
Write about the different types of fake laughs you’ve perfected or a situation where your fake laugh was so unconvincing it made things worse. Your poem could explore the inner thoughts behind the strained “ha ha” and the social contract that makes us pretend things are funny when they’re really not.
17. Predictive Text Poetry
Your phone thinks it knows what you want to say next, but the suggestions are often wild and make no sense when strung together. This can lead to some truly bizarre accidental messages.
Create a poem using only your phone’s predictive text suggestions. Start with a normal sentence and then just keep tapping the middle suggestion. The resulting nonsense will be both funny and strangely poetic, like a robot trying to understand human communication.
18. The Office Chair Olympics
Office chairs with wheels create an irresistible urge to race, spin, or attempt dangerous stunts when the boss isn’t looking. We’ve all pushed off from a desk to see how far we can roll.
Describe the secret competitions office workers have using their rolling chairs. Your poem could include made-up events like the swivel sprint or the long-distance corridor glide, complete with injuries, glory, and the shame of being caught by management during the championship finals.
19. Pretending to Know the Lyrics
We’ve all done that mumble-singing when we don’t know the words to a song. Your mouth moves, random sounds come out, then you belt the one line you actually know with total confidence.
Write about the panic of being caught fake-singing or the wild made-up lyrics people create to fill the gaps. Your poem could follow someone at a concert or karaoke night who confidently sings complete nonsense until they realize everyone around them knows the actual words.
20. The Haircut You Immediately Regretted
That moment when the stylist spins you around to face the mirror and your heart drops. This is not what you asked for, but you smile and say, “I love it!” anyway.
Capture the journey from haircut hope to hair disaster, including the fake enthusiasm in the salon and the breakdown once you get home. Your poem could track the five stages of bad haircut grief or the desperate attempts to fix it with hats, clips, or even safety scissors in the bathroom.
21. The Epic Sneeze Build-Up
Few things are as disappointing as feeling a big sneeze coming on, making the face, taking the breath… and then nothing happens. The sneeze just vanishes, leaving you unsatisfied.
Detail the emotional roller coaster of the sneeze that got away or the panicked search for anything that might help bring it back. Your poem could personify the sneeze as a trickster who enjoys teasing you, or compare the disappointment to other life letdowns.
22. The Lies We Tell Our Dentist
“Yes, I floss every day.” We all tell this fib right before the dentist pokes our bleeding gums and knows the truth. The dentist-patient relationship is built on these small, transparent lies.
Create a funny confession of all the dental fibs you’ve told or write from the dentist’s perspective, knowing you’re lying but playing along anyway. Your poem could include the guilt and preparation that goes into pretending you’ve been a model patient for the six months since your last visit.
23. Weird Things Pets Eat
Dogs and cats have strange tastes. From shoes to homework to that important document you needed for taxes, pets seem to have a sixth sense for eating exactly what you don’t want them to eat.
List the increasingly ridiculous items your pet has consumed or tell the story of trying to explain to your boss that your dog really did eat your presentation. Your poem could be from the pet’s perspective, rating the tastiness of various non-food items found around your home.
24. The Dance of Avoiding People You Know
We’ve all ducked behind store displays or suddenly found our phones fascinating to avoid talking to someone we recognize but don’t want to chat with. This social avoidance dance is universal.
Describe the panic when you spot someone from high school or that neighbor who talks too much. Your poem could include the strategic planning that goes into escape routes or the awkward moment when they see you anyway and you have to pretend you just noticed them.
25. Fighting With Self-Checkout Machines
Self-checkout should make shopping easier, but instead it’s a battle with a machine that thinks you’re stealing when you put your own bags in the bagging area. The robot voice judging your every move only makes it worse.
Write about the embarrassment of needing employee help for the simplest tasks or the frustration when the machine doesn’t recognize your items. Your poem could be written as a heated argument between shopper and checkout machine, each convinced the other is the problem.
26. The Mystery of Disappearing Pens
Pens are like socks – they vanish without a trace. You buy a pack of twenty and within days, they’ve all disappeared into some pen black hole, never to be seen again.
Your poem could propose theories about where all the missing pens go or tell the story from the pen’s perspective, detailing its escape plans and new life away from your desk. Include the inevitable moment when you find six pens at once in a weird place, solving one small part of the mystery.
27. The Horror of Group Projects
Group projects bring out the worst in humanity. There’s always one person who does nothing, one who takes over everything, and the rest just trying to survive until the due date.
Detail the stages of group project despair or create character profiles of the typical group members. Your poem could be structured as increasingly panicked text messages as the deadline approaches and half the work still isn’t done.
28. The Internal Panic of Forgetting Someone’s Name
They clearly know you, but you have no idea who they are. The longer you talk, the more awkward it becomes to ask their name, so you just keep the conversation going with generic responses.
Describe the mental gymnastics of trying to get clues about who you’re talking to or the relief when someone else says their name. Your poem could include desperate attempts to check their ID or introduce them to a friend in hopes they’ll say their own name.
29. Autocorrect’s Evil Twin: Voice-to-Text
Voice-to-text never gets it right. You dictate a serious message and end up sending something that makes you sound drunk or crazy because your phone heard everything wrong.
Create a collection of voice-to-text fails or tell the story of an important message completely ruined by bad translation. Your poem could compare what you said to what the phone heard, with increasingly disastrous miscommunications.
30. The Life Cycle of Leftovers
Leftovers in the fridge follow a predictable pattern: from delicious meal to questionable container to fuzzy science experiment that no one wants to touch.
Track the journey of forgotten food from fresh to frightening. Your poem could be written as daily fridge diary entries, noting the gradual transformation, or as a horror story where the leftovers gain sentience and plot revenge for being abandoned at the back of the shelf.
Wrapping Up
So there you have it – 30 funny things to turn into poetry gold! Even if you think you can’t write a poem, these topics make it easy. Just start typing, let the silliness flow, and worry about making it rhyme later (or don’t – rules are made to be broken).
Pick your favorite topic from the list and give it a try. The best part about funny poems is that even if they’re terrible, that just makes them funnier. So grab your pen, unleash your inner comedian, and start writing poems that will make milk come out of people’s noses when they laugh.