Month: February 2014

Another One Down

Harold Ramis, justly famous
Busting ghosts and taking namous,
Earned his stripes by shacking caddies,
Grounding hogs and schooling daddies,
Housing animals at Delta,
And by balling meat. I felt a
Multiplicity of lost
When I heard Egon’s streams got crossed.
This much I learned from Groundhog Day:
Like Phil, he’s gone, yet here to stay.

Bite Your Tongue

Don’t say things you can’t take back.
Time travels on a one-way track
And once you’ve spoken words that sting
You cannot make that bell unring.
Better just to bite your tongue
And recognize your thoughts are young:
When they grow up, they may mature.
The point is, now, you can’t be sure,
So don’t give voice to words you’ll hate
To say you said, once it’s too late.

Twinkle!

Twinkle. Twinkle! Little star,
I know exactly what you are.
You’re obstinate! But so am I,
So twinkle, or please leave the sky.
A winkless star’s no heart’s delight.
Don’t test me: I can wait all night.

Know what really chaps my ass?
Recalcitrance in balls of gas
Whose cosmic arrogance is such
That, “I don’t think I’ll twinkle much”
Is their idea of how to shine.
Go glow your own sky. Twinkle mine!

The Slow Wink Of One Eye

It’s ten minutes after the time that it was
When I started to wonder, How long till I’m ten
Minutes into the world I’m craving because
I can’t wait any longer for life to begin?

It seems, looking back, that it’s been a lot longer
Than ten little minutes, but time doesn’t lie
(Though it stretches the truth until fiction is stronger).
My whole life has been the slow wink of one eye.

The Good Old Day

Remember that day when I wasn’t exhausted?
Brought doughnuts to work (glazed old-fashioned and frosted),
Took lunch–a whole hour–then joked with the boss, did
Those hateful, time-wasteful tasks, didn’t get cross, bid
Farewell to the hell on the freeway, got lost, hid
My watch and rolled home like a Bob-stone, unmossed
And unflustered, picked up the newspaper and tossed it
Like bits of old beef stuck to used dental floss? Kid,
If you can remember that day, please remind me.
Just say it was real, I’ll be fine it’s behind me.
(Though, if one more is out there, it knows where to find me.)

Stack-O’-Cats, WI

In Stack-O’-Cats, Wisconsin, there’s a statue in the square
That looks just like you think it would;
That’s how you know you’re there.

The local sheriff’s friendly if you never break the law,
But cross the line, there ain’t no fine:
He’ll whap you with his paw!

The Stack-O’-Cats Town Council meets on Tuesday nights at eight.
They’re done by ten because that’s when
They guess each others’ weight.

In Stack-O’-Cats they argue over every little thing
Like planting trees and parking fees
And what makes birdies sing.

On Main Street there’s a roller-coaster car, bright green and white,
That sits outside the Dairy Pride–
It just showed up one night.

The Towers of Meow–the high school teams–excel at sports!
They’re also great debaters,
But the 4-H pigs have warts.

Stack-O’-Cats, Wisconsin, where your life’s an open book
That no one reads, ’cause no one needs:
They know what path you took.

In Stack-O’-Cats they’re down-to-earth: They only use first names,
‘Less yours, of course, is Wilberforce,
And then they call you James.

Stack-O’-Cats, Wisconsin, where you’re taller when you smile,
And no one dances where their pants is.
Guess I’ll stay awhile.