When they become a toxin in your mind,
when they steal, lie, and threaten your life,
even if they're blood, it's time to cut ALL ties.
Your heart was not meant to be used as a spittoon.
Your mind was not meant to be used as a trampoline
for their a flimsy-half assed sobriety.
Walk away, cut them loose before they spit and cut on you.
Your life is a precious gem to be treated with great respect.
Two-legged toxins dull luster and fang the pulse from the neck.
A crack in the pavement
Does it portend
a death in the family
an untimely end
Is it an opening
for widow’s weeds
or just a spittoon
for sunflower seeds
*Image of Ten Gallon Stetson by IBA.
A Hat Full
A cowboy with a ten-gallon hat,
Seen a spittoon and gave it a spat,
A girl screamed, "That's my vase!",
She then frowned in his face,
And stepped on his hat and made it flat.
2022 May 07
*1st Place*
High Noon
~~Joseph May: Judged 2022 May 08
RZ, HMS: 9,9,6,6,9.
Cerise took a bite of the cherry
ground her teeth on the pip
a kernel of truth searching salvation
conditioned to drivel and drool
Salvador handed her a spittoon
to release the rest of the lies
24th July 2021
Bite Size Poem no 14
Sponsor Line Gauthier
Their bridled haunt, each day may be their last; yeehaw.*
The narrow way, down mountainside, and clop of shoes.
The saddlebags dip left and right in gait and gnaw.
The spirit wind and pouring rain their hoofs refuse.
Begs me to ask, “Are horses as brave as cowboys?”
Lights’ heads bowed low to the path of perilous sight.
The kick of spurred heel, a “Giddyap,” of steel, “Go boy!”
They’re made to trek down mountainsides as stones ignite.
What’s turned ‘round the head of Roy, his slack rope in lead?
This corral dust, no it is fact, the slip and slide**
of horse-hide, ain’t no dignity of his tan breed.
No grave for him, his service blow is bonafide.
The cowboys “yip” and “holla” spittoon-chew and cussed.
Ornery snorts, flyswatter tails replay course sounds.
The clinch mountain, after hazardous ride, kicked dust
in snout of grieving herd; and buckskins stood their ground.
1/20/2021
Cowboy Poetry
Sponsor: Line Gauthier
*yeehaw - used to express delight. Here I’ve used sarcasm.
**corral dust - lies and tall tales
***clinch mountain - rye whiskey
HMS used for 12 syllable count. Site was off on 2 lines.
Sloppy Santa spent his Christmas jolly
Until in folly he sat on holly
Yet Old Saint Nick laughed like a loon.
Bright eyes twinkling, his cap did doff
Watching a rich eggnog run off
With his dear sweet hot cross bun, soon
To a damp honeymoon spittoon.
Santa saw it, please do not scoff.
12/22/2020
Is there a reason why all ballplayers spit
Can they get to the majors, if a spittoon they can't hit
Twenty paces while chawing
On tobaccy, while jawing
At the ump, methinks its likely tradition, I submit
Mary Six Pack Pistols staggers through time portals drunk
Pretending to be a priest but she is not a mister or a sister
To the old west saloon through double doors she glides
Drunker than a nun on steroids swinging rosaries from her side
Into a smoke filled room in rusty spurs and fake mustache
Presenting herself as a monsignor from another time and place
Cowboy boots caked in mud with love she blesses them
Introducing her two guns from underneath a long black dress
It is a curtain, a robe, a nun inside a habit for blasting baddies
There must be a shower outside which indicates a storm
The spittoon in the corner of the room needs emptying
She feels the weight of outlaws in her midst
From here to there the crowd looks innocent
But Padre knows better so shoots them all to death
To kingdom come and back again through the chest
Through time corridors we suspect they must be dust
Mary Six Pack says a prayer and drinks some holy water
From a whiskey bottle in another time dimension soaking wet
Then returns from there to here less sober and less blessed
Charged with a misdemeanor for impersonating a monsignor
I never knew that most monkeys will swoon
To eat bananas in a real saloon --
They'll snarf down bunches
After monster lunches --
Then vomit up the peels in the spittoon
He rolls up and
down on life’s
surface as a
droplet on the
*colocasia leaf.
He never walks
with his life
hand in hand.
While heaping
up yellow metal
and rupee on the
side-walk, green
life gets wasted
in his mind’s nook.
Time passes with
pastimes, but he
doesn’t see.
Now his body
and arm-chair
are antique alike.
He stays afloat
like a banana
stem. He chews
bits of areca-nut
wrapped in betel,
smeared with a
nip of lime. He
spits red shapeless
fury into a brass
spittoon. His lazy
children grow up
on the mount of
money. Often
Kaaka smokes a
beedi. Curls of
futility rise up.
*Colocasia is a tropical plant with its leaves
having a natural ultrahydrophobic surface.
First appeared in The Literary Hatchet.
The trip was all set in our hot-air balloon
Conditions were flight-perfect; 'twas the middle of June
Just needed a few shots of courage from a local saloon
In case up from nowhere sprang a devilish typhoon …
We successfully launched from a local sand dune
On board was the sponsor, a bigshot tycoon
Along with a fellow who told jokes, the buffoon
And a bassoonist who blew and crooned loony tunes ...
Now for good luck we brought on board a baboon
Who ate butterflies fresh from the cocoon
He had a face like a prune, was a bit of a goon--
Gave demonstrations on how to use a spittoon ...
This monkey had with him a metal harpoon
So that at a favorable moment opportune
He surprised the full moon, tied her up to his pantaloon
~ and stabbed her with a cheesy grin most jejune
Long time ago, in lonesome youth shine
In a wonder state of boykind
Making paper pontoons
Skying an oar, in a creek lagoon
On a yummy, afternoon
In swampy, draconian, water spittoon
The artsy-crafty, paper tub boat
I heedlessly, knacked, to float
Voraciously, rocked and rolled
Swiftly, into wet slimy herbage
Between crying, wet, musty edges
Cruising, murmuring, delicate, breezes
While under perpetual, shiny, sky
With a calming, breeze, high
My desolate vessel going bye-bye
Sailing, sailing away
Like the days, that passed
When once, a young spirited sass
A crab sidewinds
The windowsill
With the Earth
In his hands,
Whilst a mouse
With a red breast
Smiles and gives a wink
To the lizard in the lounge.
Mars is using
The rotary
On 16 and 17
For spittoon practice,
Whilst the Defence
Refuses to move
Her boat from duty
At the pelican on Pall Mall.
Each thought is
Thinking another,
With the wisdom
Of a penguin crossing
The road at a
Zebra crossing;
That be some,
But not a lot!
To old places would I could go,
With these photographs to remind,
Where horse and buggy in time slow,
On dusty roads mine to rewind.
Where upon a porch made of wood,
In a rocker where I would sit;
With a hound dog, oh yes I could,
And a spittoon filled with spit.
While a lemonade close at hand,
In the heat I'd be complainin'
But 'cause we're hayin' you'd understand,
I'd be thankful it weren't rainin'.
And Ma'd have grits on the griddle
While bumble bees were the only sound;
Yep, nothin' else as I whittle,
'Ceptin' them wood chips all around.
Now a little paint I'd be thinkin',
Could use them windows and doors,
But with my lemonade drinkin'
There was just so many chores.
Until from these photos leaping,
My old wife, how could I forget?
“Yes dear,” I say, “I'm still sweeping.”
And would I could go back? You bet!
Is there a reason why all ballplayers spit
Can they get to the majors, if a spittoon the can't hit
Twenty paces while chawing
On tabaccy while jawing
At the ump, methinks it's likely tradition I submit
© Jack Ellison 2015
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