the failure to check [SM] I'll try and be kind! 'Araby', with its stress on the second syllable is very hard to rhyme and scan. And the fact that you had to tailor the word for tobacco AND the word for Arabia to make a first line makes me think you were trying too hard whilst ignoring the basics. If it doesn't scan, it, er, doesn't scan.
Is italic, and forty feet tall [penelope] I'll return the kindness. It's a BAC-ee from OLD ara BEE. "Baccy" was common usage when I was a lad; my pipe-smoking father never referred to it by any other name. The Archaic "Araby" seemed to fit perfectly with "old".
Hidden textIt's a baccy from old Araby / Burns smoothly and lights easily / Just one single match / And the dried-up leaves catch / And I suck down the fumes greedily
Hidden textthat's all very well Sierra Mike - but it's a team game and you have to take into account the mind-set of the ... anyway, enough of these convoluted justifications for *bad play* - can we just get on with the game? It was working rather well up there ^^
[Spangle]Hidden text Bad play? The scansion was straight from ISIHAC and the previous line (and I STILL can't imagine how penelope came up with her metre for the line), google hits baccy on the first try and the limerick I wrote in response was from the top of my head, stream of consciousness. An easy rhyme, with acceptable scansion. Doesn't get more team oriented than that.
(Raak)Hidden textI passed my mouse over it but that was after the following 2 posters had completely ignored it. It was very much in the spirit of what I intended when I began with a 'Hide' - nice one Tuj. I fear some of us are too subtle