Written April 13, 2011

What a birthday day
Don Adams, Al Green, Al Butts
— Scrabble’s creator

Adams’ Maxwell Smart
Brought us the first cell (shoe) phone
And Cone of Silence

Mel Brooks, Buck Henry
Were the big comedy brains
Behind spy buffoon

So Max Smart was dumb
Sidekick “99” was smart
And both made us laugh

“CONTROL” fought “KAOS”
Eventually, good guys won
But first chaos reigned

Belated wishes
Would’ve been better for Smart:
“Missed it by that much!”

Righteous Rev. Al Green,
Yeah, “I’m Still in Love With You”
And will be always

“Let’s Stay Together”:
Al, you sing; I’ll listen;
It’s better that way

The Scrabble man made
Special rule, always gave Green
Triple points for “soul”

Alfred Mosher Butts,
Architect, built legacy
Out of words instead

The Scrabble man says
The best resort for a spell
Is Dr. Webster’s

So what’s in a name?
You might ask if yours was “Butts”
Or your game struggled

“Lexico” became
“Criss Cross Words,” groped frantically,
Then scored as “Scrabble”

Rest is history:
One hundred fifty million
Game sets sold worldwide

“Will my ‘x’ work there”?
“What can I spell with this ‘z’?”
Games go on and on

Butts, at 93,
Put “finishe-” in front of “d”
Used up his letters