She was a strong woman; everyone said it.
Elvira is so strong! Strong as an ox. Strong as a bull.
She was proud of it too; it was her reputation.
If something needs to be lifted, go get Elvira! Her family bragged.
“She can lift a cow!” her little bother told anyone who listened.
“Elvira has the back of a farmer,” Daddy boasted.
Hank, a traveling salesman needed a strong healthy woman.
He was selling his magic elixir, and he needed a female specimen
To show how potent it was, that it caused super strength.
Her strength would come in mighty handy. He decided to court her.
After their honeymoon they ran into her sister who was married to his main competitor.
“Let me guess,” the competitor said.
“They told you she was as strong as a cow.”
once a slick salesman from nice
soaked his suits in tubs of grease
so he slid through town
with nary a frown
till someone called the police.
Do you buy your truth
from a traveling salesman
— snake oil.
7/17/2018
Duncan Hines
Long before homemade peach clobber
Just after apple pie and before fruit bowl in melon rind
Restaurateur Duncan Hines
Birth in 1880
His dad a confederate soldier
Mother died when he was 4
In his late teens attendance Bowling Green College
Later became a traveling salesman
For a Chicago salesman
Just doin fine
Duncan Hines
later, correlated compiled list turn to book
about locally neighboring restaurants around the country
a book called Adventures in good Eating
Hines wrote and cook mission completed
Ahh! more somethings to eat
Next was Duncan bread
With Durkee bakery proprietors
Later sold to Nebraska Consolidated
ConAgra, Omaha Nebraska
From bread to developing cake mixes
In the early sixties purchased by Proctor and Gamble
Mmm!! boy taste great
Let them eat cake
For a Chicago salesman
Just doin fine
Duncan Hines
At the time
Duncan Hines
12/06/17by James Edward Lee Sr.
Another day, another town
Another hotel room.
I’m thinking of my beloved home,
With roses all in bloom.
My wife is waiting for me there,
My children and my dog,
While I sit in this lonely room
Engaged in monolog.
There was a time I thought I would
Enjoy the traveling life,
But that was before I had acquired
My children, dog and wife.
The plumber and electrician,
The teacher, doctor, farmer
Will all be heading after work
To where home fires burn warmer.
Pity the traveling salesman,
Butt of too many jokes.
He longs to be in his own home,
The same as other working folks.
2/7/13
Written for contest "In A Hotel Room"
The four walls of this hotel room
Look the same as the four walls of the other
The name of the city where you happen to be
Is just another detail in which you smoother
The life of the traveler sounds glamorous
To those we leave at home
But there is no glamour lying awake all night
In a double-bed all alone
It’s the same sad faces in the hotel bar
Spending per-diems on a meal of booze
Business suits searching for the next prospect
Submitting bids they’re apt to loose
Your wife takes care of things at home
Thinking you’re out having a good time
While you wonder if at her bedroom door
The neighbor men are forming a line
Lunches consumed in airport terminals
Rental cars of all shapes and size
There is nothing fun about the people you meet
In the not-so-friendly skies
Yet bills must be paid
And your bread is buttered on the road
But don’t believe that this life is grand
Regardless of the lies the traveler has told
>What has happened to my hometown
>Satan has come along and turned it around
>Changed the outlook from the way it use to be
>Putting those in bondage that use to run free
>
>Causing a lot of problems for the young and the old
>Stealing their joy trying to steal their soul
>It makes me very sad how things turned out to be
>What happened to my hometown really affected me
>
>Seams like yesterday we were all together
>Family and friends trying to live better
>Like a thief in the night satan came on the scene
>Breaking up famlies acting real mean
>
>Remind me of a traveling salesman going door to door
>Preying on the rich as well as the poor
>Somebody told me old satan is still around
>Waiting to destroy more lives in my hometown.
>
> Thomas Swist, Jr,
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