Peddled Poems

Karma and Charisma

     Karma and Charisma
       couldn’t be more unlike

     Charisma peddled effortlessly
       Karma fell off his bike

Flames And Fire

Lies are a bill you pay later
And they might make you a traitor
Cut your nose to spite your face
But you have surely lost this race
In your hands you held a life
That you chose to give nothing but strife
So now you want to play messiah
But in reality you're just a pariah
Look at all of those who walked away
A social circle dwindled to nothing today
And you keep running but keep falling
From the bevy of sins we find appalling
You put up walls, dilapidated walls
Destined and damned to fall
If you present a D to evil it becomes the devil
And now for you that's just a lost level
Because you fail to measure up to your grade
And now from all sides you face the shade
And now you see lies are a bill you pay later
But it still hurts my heart to call you a traitor
Lies rely on more lies to get by to get high
To fly and soar and sigh and ask why
You wasted your chance to be a messiah
And now you're just a pathetic pariah
Who peddled falsities like a liar
Now you face the flames and fire

Hunger

We hunger for wonder
When appease is the disease. 
Fill to the gill with swill and still 
miss the bliss. 
Settle for what’s peddled
Yet crave beyond the grave. 
Beware of despair
And reverse the curse. 
Hold out for the knock out. 
Don’t compromise for the downsize. 
And look crosswise when you surmise your demise. 
The miracle is in the spiritual. 
Not the estate we await.

Tinker To Baltimore

Once came a smart tinker to Baltimore
He peddled his pots near a dry-goods store
He hawked them all in one day
For whatever folks would pay
Then hurriedly left and came back with more.

written January 19, 2022

The Book of Ezra - Il Miglior Fabbro

Dear Mr. Pound, 
Your holiday in Italy
Has besmirched your legacy.
Your Cantos, they plead, 
But don’t exonerate,
Not as far as I can see.

Dear Mr. Pound, 
Did praise from Hemingway 
Whet your narcissistic thirst?
As an ex-pat abroad, 
Did you assimilate 
What enlightened nations curse?

Dear Mr. Pound, 
You made Il Duce smile.
There’s evidence that proves it.
Was your Republic of Utopia 
Bi-polar by design?
Or was it simply hubris?

Dear Mr. Pound, 
You strain my intellect
With your imagery of life,
And turn my conscience 
Hard on itself
With a keen, dissecting knife.

Dear Mr. Pound, 
Your lyrics sing to me,
But your politics offend.
You peddled fascist ideology.
If you want my true opinion,
I refuse to condescend.

Lets Go Fly a Bike

Those BMX bikers were kicking up dust 
But the blockade ahead meant they had to have trust
The little green guy with a face like a sprout
Would come up with something to help them all out

The soldiers in Jeep’s that were blocking the road
Studied their sergeant who grinned as he strode
His carbine was loaded and held firm and steady
Hey kids, you've run out of road... already

The kids saw that soon they’d have no road at all
For first there were Jeeps... then a twenty foot wall
Their wrinkled up friend better do something good
As each of them peddled as fast as they could

The soldiers could see that those bikes they weren't slowing
Those bikes were still coming... but wouldn't be going
Machine carbines raised at the oncoming children
No soldier was sure they’d be able to kill them

Faster and faster those pedals were spinning
The little green alien just sat there grinning
And then they soared over those Jeeps, that’s not all
Those kids all got splatted against that brick wall 
 
                                 *

[and then Mr Spielberg responded in person
I think I just might film a different version]

Pot Luck

A leprechaun’s pot held no gold

Just vaccine of value untold

He peddled injections

Stopped Covid infections

But still has no shot for a cold





February 24, 2021
For Milton's St. Patrick's Day Limerick contest

Land of Opportunity

I take my hat off for the flag
  I stand up straight; let others sag
I get all weepy for Old Glory
  thinking of my family's story

They came from Russia with naught but hope
  with just their wits to help them cope
No language skills or education either
  Money or living quarters, they had neither

But they scraped and scrimped, and just kept going
  Gramps peddled junk, grams did the sewing
And with the help of God, it all worked out
  Hard work and faith -- their kids did sprout

My father an attorney, my uncle a physician
  All due to gram and gramps' prescient intuition
To emigrate alone, part of no community
  to an unknown land of opportunity

The Junk Pile

THE JUNK PILE
                        
                             By Jerry May


Orange with rust and gray with weathered
worn decay, 
the heap behind the shed has seen it’s useful better days.
Every discarded piece of junk layered in the miscellaneous maze,
once was brand new and factory fresh before it was forgotten and left to lay.

 
The underpinning of the pile an umbrella used only once and left deployed, 
Borrowed from grandpa's car and carefreely turned into a toy. 
The spines skewered the spokes of a girl's birthday wish now destroyed,
consequently peddled to pieces to see a cute neighbor boy.  

On the rotted pink bike an essential portal of almost every day, 
when growing town was more than walking distance away.
An old  hand painted mailbox now uprooted and discarded into the maze,
now a comfortable home for spiders and mice to play and live during the day. 

There a mix of assorted wire, wood and metal violated with corroded nails and screws,
in a snarl of waiting tetanus all serving a purpose or two.
The most recent additions on the heap and  a sign of modern times,
an outdated computer and a microwave that the garbage man denied.

Read All About It

I peddled papers that cost just a dime
In my baskets that rode on balloon tires so fine
Made some tips, about four of five bucks
birds spread the news too, so do all the ducks
do you think that they are in the choir
they entertain you for free and not for hire.
going to the ball game cost you a days pay
innings are long, food is bad, so you don’t stay
where can you go and become amused
best things in life are free, and a dime for the news

Blind Counsel

Apart from my Reason in all of my schemes:
I gave up pretending to live in Her dreams
My vexing ambition for solace had turned
By then, the intrigue of our love brightly burned

Our hearts were pretenders which writhed in the dust
From Love to deception, deception to lust
Content in our sorrow, we buried our shame
We played with our motives, assigning the blame

With demons as counsel, we came out at night
The words which we peddled were senseless and trite
Devoid of ambition, I gave up the ghost
Of All My Intention, I miss Her the most

I wake in this silence with all of my thoughts
With each passing second, our trust slowly rots
Between my synapses, I find Her asleep
Disgruntled, this silence is all we would reap...

Selvedge Edges

Blue-checkered curtains are faded and drawn,..
after the years since she made them from gunny-sack cloth

The Singer, long idle, now gathers more dust,
with its needle still threaded and the treadle at rest

As I clear out the room, I think of long hours
of foot-peddled power, and strength in her soul.

She would unroll the fabric of roses and flowers,
with determined resilience in dark circled eyes.

But prudence, endurance, would salvage a way

Abandoned and left in a sea of lost dreams
She picked up the pieces, of patterns and hems 
Making a living, and raising her kin,
didn't come easy,  but she had to win

A life left unraveled, she must sew up again.  
Working past midnight. Spindles would spin. Somehow rekindled
to live once again. 
Making ends meet. Selvedge edges and hems
Sowing her heart, sowing her skill, and sowing her soul
Sewn together again

______________________________________________________
4/20/18

Even In

I got a call from an angel
Floating on a cloud.

I made her laugh with the last message I sent her.

Misinterpreted messages lost in the light of the sun.

With ears at attention there was a brief silence.

Walking through the hall of infatuation.

She made me smile.

My hearts done none stop jumping jacks since the first time I saw her smile.

I told her about a dream I had.

Changing into something a bit more subtle.

We back peddled to the day we first met.

Just before the first date, but right after the third date.

The first moment that felt like we ascended.

The way time always seems to fly when were together.

The songs that describe exactly what it feels like to deeply understand.

The breaks between the bass where our hearts completely zoned out in a full day dream.

Knowing the words to every song that played.

Selectively introverted to the world around.

A mixed bag in the variables of comfort.

An audience of denim in a world filled with leggings.

Even in silence I send my prayers.

To an angel whom answers, as well as makes calls of her own

Empty Is the Pot

Put on the water,
and boil it real, real hot
Sprinkle in a dash of salt of deprivation,
then put in a hefty portion of whatnot
A generic brand of anything of no substance;
meat substandard,
having zero nutritional value
Seething through and through
the bone of contention
Waste by-products peddled in the ghetto
Tainted meat sold past the expiration date
My bloated belly babies,
with anxious eyes, holding out their plates
Contents ready to eat
And I, with shame, give them unnourishing things ...
defiled food that my body purchased and got
Now though the kettle boils over,
empty is the pot

Perhaps the Truth

Perhaps the truth should soften its face
So the great lie need not expose its hidden truths
To the shame of so many, stained by an act of
Self inflicted casual violence, ruining a nation.

For who is the greater sinner.
The liar or the listener.
And of the lie whose truth is known
By both, becoming the spoken word
Debased and futile.

And Jesus said "forgive them
For they know not what they do"
Yet how can they forgive themselves
Who peddled in the lie knowing the truth.

For a man is nothing without honour,
Just the spittle to grist the wheel of the great lie
Afraid to look in the mirror of his soul
For the mirror tells only the truth 
Revealing the petty stupidity
Of a fool.

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