Before remotes, we changed the channels
Right on the TV.
We got up from the couch to learn
What there was there to see.
When things got modern, we could sit
And use the new remote
To flip from show to show, deciding
Which would get our vote.
But now, we have remotes galore
And I can never tell
Which one to use and so I fiddle
‘Round for quite a spell.
My husband knows the magic trick
To find just what I need.
As long as he’s around
I’ll watch my program, guaranteed.
But at my son’s house, bets are off.
It really gets my goat
That to watch the U.S. Open,
Chances really are remote.
Looking back, it seems I've made a giant plastic nest.
Plastic cars -plastic totes- plastic toys
plastic guns- plastic utensils- plastic boats
plastic bags- plastic Easter eggs- plastic remotes.
Plastic Jesus hanging from a plastic cross
a plastic grimace on his perfect plastic face.
I've fallen hard for plastics
so cheap
so practical
no more slivers of glass in the soul
It's really God-like
it's an all-around helpful entity
we can dump our excessive baggage.
It'll never complain- it never goes away...
Plastic was the answer
until it worked its way into the food chain.
Back in the day, at about the age of 7 or 8
mother(step) schooled me on how to wash dishes.
The plastic plates were the toughest to master.
Mother(step) would run her finger over the surface.
Like a pimply teenager's face, all but impossible to get rid of all the grease.
She'd disgustedly toss the plastic God
back into the greasy suds.
I'd scrub the greasy sin from my plastic God...
over and over again.
Plastic has polluted me. I have a plastic brain.
The price I pay for sleeping with plastic people.
Some other people’s dogs bite, snarl and snap like turtles on speed.
Our young puppy Beau dances, twirls, and bites his tail as if he’s on weed.
The other dog, Buddy, is a gentle giant, over a hundred pounds of love.
He was sent to us via a dumping, from angels who live well above.
It is no accident that God and Dog have the same three letters.
Beau, our deranged puppy is one of those romantic go-getters.
Being a retriever, he fetches everything – leaves, sticks, or a ball.
We are such dog people, we have four dog beds lying in our hall.
They might want to drink water, so we have six gray water bowls.
Buddy sits calmly while Beau digs enormous muddy burying holes.
They have personalities that keep us excited, they fill us with joy.
They want to eat our slippers and remotes, ignoring every dog toy.
In memory that wouldn’t get upgrades
You stay, and you’ll remain there till I go
One day wasn’t circled on your calendar of dates
Now empty is the room we used to know
The August Macke painting on the wall
Your table, stuffed with papers, vapes, remotes
And signs you left of missed video calls
Remain in memory, that in its turn, erodes
The visual memory of you keeps our time
When we were close, as close as we could be
You laughed your head back – when this image will decline
You’ll take me where you are now, I believe.
Gloria Gupta's garbage bin
Has got all sort of trash within:
A starched piece of mouldy bread,
A broken doll without a head.
Three empty cans of soya beans,
Uncle Jimmy's old torn jeans.
Papers, documents that don't work,
Spoons and old dishes and forks.
Used out pens, money clips,
Broken lunch packs and bags of chips.
Bones and food that's began stinking...
I wonder what Gloria's thinking,
Cellphone covers and old remotes,
To do lists and cancelled notes.
Markers, socks and old CD's,
Bottles, cans, macaroni,
An old pair of worn out shoes
And a torn heart she can't use...
Gloria Gupta's garbage bin
Has got all sort of trash within.
We named him Buddy. He is a Great Dane German Shepherd mix
A baby; we keep saying we should have called him Marmaduke.
In one month he has chewed up at least a hundred things.
He has chewed the lids off of twenty-four water bottles and six juices.
Did he dump them? No. He did it without spelling a drop of juice.
I am down to two pairs of shoes.. Four are tattered and torn.
He chewed up a brand-new car cover which had never been used.
He demolished a package of Styrofoam paper plates too.
When we go to bed we don’t know what we will wake up to.
The living room is usually full of things we forgot that we had owned.
One day I recognized the shredded material but did not know why.
It was a child’s umbrella, I had not seen for ten years.
He is the chewing-est dog we have ever had.
And we have adopted nineteen dogs.
If he ever decides to chew up the furniture
We might have to think of obedience school.
We have chew marks on our TV remotes.
He demolished an Amazon gift card box.
Need I go on? We love the big lug.
We call him the big galoot; and we are glad he was dumped here.
All my home remotes died today in Spring.
Dumbstruck by 'GreyTooth' the Pirate King.
Who like Harald 'Bluetooth', the Danish Monarch
had a dead blue-grey tooth in his head, a hallmark
of how smart a pirate he was to stage a scam demand
that I pay a ransom to release my remotes from remand.
So what do I do as nothing works without a remote?
I feel like a wader poking fingers down hole's throat,
hoping to get a reaction from my TV, Stereo and other devices,
that only work to the sounds of remote signal advice's,
made by Bluetooth in responses to keystrokes.
This reliance on remote devices really sucks, folks.
Where do remotes go, is what I,
in aggravation ask?
Mine must have feet and to find
them is a most frustrating task.
Hiding under a magazine or my cat
lying on it, hatching one like an egg?
I have tried many methods, but I swear,
mine all have their own tiny legs.
Do they get together at night and have
meetings to strategize?
I think they really do, those teeny monsters,
is what I do conceptualize!
September 19, 2020
7pm PST
7pm PST
(each stanza is a Senryu poem)
We, the resistance,
are here, stationed on our couches
armed with our remotes.
Camouflaged in our
faded PowerPuff pajamas
and fuzzy slippers
We are determined.
Yes, we have evaded contact
and forsaken love.
We few, lay down such
as freedom for honest care
for our fellow man.
Woke up at 4:00 a.m.
Not the witching hour.
I am usually up around three.
Woke up and ran to the computer.
She made her happy melodic I am ready song.
Thank god as I have to wake up my husband if she does not sing.
He can run all of the remotes
And fix all of the computers
Knowing what power cords to unplug
And what buttons to push.
If he runs away, I will be helplessly without
Anything that runs on electricity
For I have forgotten all of the stuff he has shown me
About six thousand times
Not really interested
Screams of a woman being murdered
Woke me up from the loveliest dream
My startled face shook me awake.
Listened harder. My husband has the TV up to highest volume.
He is probably asleep in front of it,
and it has turned itself up for attention.
I close my bedroom door and try to recover my dream.
I was in the middle of a meadow with wild strawberries
Queen Anne's lace and wild daisies. It was delightful!
SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAM!
I jump out of bed and patter into his office.
He is snoring loudly in front of five TVs.
I use five remotes before I figure out how to turn them off.
He wakes up. "Hey! I was watching that!"
I give him the look and go back to bed,
Mad as a tornado now for the meadow is gone,
and my mind is full of violent murderers outside,
trying to get in and get me.
I can only hope they get to him first...
looking beyond the sky, yes i stare above the mountain.
to climb it in several trips that at last i build a tower.
withing my thought the heavens raise their smiles but the earth place me bellow the mountain.
rest became my enemy that at the end we will all leap for joy.
prayer became my lover but in a loud voice i heard the negative of my prayer.
melancholy became my lover that i be a lover of women for joy.
several were called, none was chosen,
the instrument of the village remotes for failure.
mr sylvester udemezue was right about you but i was made powerless to bring you down.
daily sleeping in the class and pressing of my phone to overcome the sleep,
though i studied like tomorrow will be the exam day yet failure laid its hand on me.
oh, lest i be ungrateful.
it is only the foolish one that will not appreciate God.
there is nothing that happens to man without God knowing.
praise to the creator for the unfolding success.
TV’s didn’t have remotes
Way back when I was young
And though the praises of
All “modern” items have been sung…
It really wasn’t such a chore
To get up off our butts
To change a channel, but before
You laugh and call me nuts…
You have to understand that there
Were 7 stations, max.
I guess we had the quality
Today’s indulgence lacks.
So switching shows was much more rare
And it was no big deal.
A couch potato’s way of life,
To most, would not appeal.
Since there was less obesity,
A theory I could float
Is blaming this on exercise
We’ve lost with the remote!
My Grandmother's Hands
My Grandmother's hands told many tales
Of scrubbing steps and broken nails
Hand-washing clothes in enamel sink
Red football socks turned white towels pink
When not baking cakes at the old gas stove
Rag-rugs with old scraps of material she wove
Pantry shelves filled with powdered egg
Homemade rice pudding sprinkled with nutmeg
Sea-coal burning on an open coal fire
Bread on a toasting fork burning like a pyre
Grandma plumping up pillows from beneath granda’s head
Applying ointment to sores caused by being confined to bed
Hours spent at auctions bidding with her hand
Buying an incomplete bed wasn't what she planned
Back home in time for tea, crumpets and homemade strawberry jam,
I can still recall the smell of it, bubbling in the pan
Switching tv channels with a flick of her wrist
That’s how we did it back then, when remotes did not exist
Working hard all of her life, meeting everyone's demands
Every line and wrinkle told a story
On my Grandmother's hands
I travelled to my daughters home
to babysit the kids
I’d not been there ten minutes when
my mind was on the skids
and not because I couldn’t cope
I’m qualified, I think
But I couldn’t work their microwave
To warm the baby’s drink
I thought to use the kettle
As a secondary ploy
But no instructions were to hand
For this confusing toy
A pan then as a last resort
Would be my saving grace
But couldn’t turn the oven on
To save my blushing face
Plan B then, turn the telly on
The cartoons never fail
But five remotes soon had me beat
‘twas now my turn to wail
the garden and a trampoline
would now my saviour be
but now faced with a locked back door
I couldn’t find the key
Distraught, I looked for games to play
I would succeed, I would
And then 6 words which saved my life
“I’m back, have they been good?”
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