The Pope is dying,
clinging to life like any other shmuck.
When my mother died,
(bless her excommunicated heart),
she lay in State as serene
as a sleeping cat under a fading sun.
Dogs don't care about death,
death is just another bone
to chew upon
as they sleepwalk through their last hours.
Death's doorstep
has been good to me.
I have dwelt upon it before
shivering and naked
holding my penitent
like a tarnished talisman.
Death has been kind to me,
I have shaken its door,
it rattled like an ill-fitting denture.
Behind a hollow lock
I could hear
a dog continuously barking -
a Pontiff pleading with it to stop,
a silky cat purring.
I heard a deeper sound,
my mother's compassionate laughter
for we who were begot
only to wait until.
Categories:
shmuck, poetry,
Form: Free verse
you wouldn’t even know
came a long time ago
you wouldn’t believe
it’s different now
I’ll get what I need
cut down your store
one guy’s bribes
you chop it for your good
employees you crook
Categories:
shmuck, best friend,
Form: Free verse
(The Torre Vela is a prominent castle tower
at the "prow" of the Alhambra Palace, and
dominates the Spanish city of Granada.)
My lame-ass lips can't even draw
McDonalds milkshake through a straw:
and if I must
run for the bus,
I take an oxygen inhaler.
You like your house? I rent a trailer.
But yell it through the loudest-hailer:
I kissed Leila!
Some lucky guy looks like George Clooney,
while I resemble Mickey Rooney.
I'm such a shmuck,
if vampires suck,
then call me Vlad the (Bad) Impaler!
I guard my dough? Like a drunken sailor.
But study this at Yale, or Baylor:
I kissed Leila!
I'll never win that Golden Globe
for lounging in a silken robe
like Errol Flynn,
appearing in
a bedroom scene with young Liz Taylor:
my books won't sell like Norman Mailer:
my jokes are rustier and staler
than ol' Jed Clampett's cotton baler:
I'm a no-mark, lamester, loser, failer.
But shout it from the Torre Vela:
I kissed Leila!
Categories:
shmuck, humorous,
Form: Rhyme
(Torre Vela = prominent tower, part of
the Alhambra palace, Granada, Spain)
My lame-ass lips can't even draw
McDonalds milkshake through a straw:
and if I must
run for the bus,
I take an oxygen inhaler.
You like your house? I rent a trailer.
But yell it through the loudest-hailer:
I kissed Leila!
Some lucky guy looks like George Clooney,
while I resemble Mickey Rooney.
I'm such a shmuck,
if vampires suck,
then call me Vlad the (Bad) Impaler!
I guard my dough? Like a drunken sailor.
But study this at Yale, or Baylor:
I kissed Leila!
I'll never win that Golden Globe
for lounging in a silken robe
like Errol Flynn,
appearing in
a bedroom scene with young Liz Taylor:
my books won't sell like Norman Mailer:
my jokes are rustier and staler
than ol' Jed Clampett's cotton baler:
I'm a no-mark, lamester, loser, failer.
But shout it from the Torre Vela:
I kissed Leila!
Categories:
shmuck, humorous,
Form: Rhyme
Meniscus, meniscus, my coffee is cool.
Little meniscus I'm nobody's fool.
Once you seemed warmer; held by my hand.
Then there's this draft from a Tim Horton's fan.
Might be the windows cooling me down.
Maybe the door rifting around.
Regretting my coffee; some see my frown.
Little meniscus my cold little crown.
Maybe I'm thirsty; maybe too cool.
Currents come at me; stealing my drool.
Little meniscus forgive what I said.
Now that I'm drinking and thirsting instead.
Little mensicus circling my cup.
Not rising over and burning this shmuck!
Categories:
shmuck, angst, dedication, devotion, food,
Form: Couplet