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Best Poems Written by James Rasmusson

Below are the all-time best James Rasmusson poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

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Seven Dwarfs

~Seven Dwarfs~  (limerick sequence)*

There once was a dwarf named Doc,
Who saw patients around the clock.
He hadn’t gone to medical school,
Yet his patients he could easily fool,
For his meds were always chalk.

There once was a dwarf named Sleepy,
Whose wife was extremely weepy.
She wanted to travel
But couldn’t unravel
His hair from the bed canopy.

There once was a dwarf named Happy,
Who ate only fudge and taffy.
His tummy got big.
He looked like a pig.
So he switched to chocolate frappé.

There once was a dwarf named Bashful,
Who’s wallet was always cash full.
Too timid to spend
For fear he’d offend
The peons whose homes were trash full.

There once was a dwarf named Dopey,
Who’s mind was mightily mopey.
His speech was so slow
His belle didn’t know
That he wanted to elopey.

There once was a dwarf named Grumpy,
Who became a little rumpy.
He ran ten miles a day,
But much to his dismay,
His butt just became real lumpy.

There once was a dwarf named Sneezy,
Whose allergies made him wheezey.
He wanted to play the romantic lead,
But instead did the voice of a dying steed,
In a film by Martin Scorsese.

*the real ending to "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs"

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My Final Meal

If I were a prisoner on death row
just hours away from execution
I would NOT order a meal of calamari with ratatouille,
filet mignon with truffles and Strawberry Sherbet.

I would reject a plate of Duck Liver Terrine with Confit Quail
garnished by Baby Leeks and Porcini mushrooms.
I would sneer at Saskatoon berries and Niagara peaches
dripping in lavender honey and maple syrup.

Peking duck, Scottish kippers, caviar, abalone
Siberian meat dumplings and escargot
washed down with a fruity chardonnay and a supple merlot
would not be of interest to me.

I’d insist on a baked Russet potato
freshly picked from an Idaho organic farm
topped off with Schuler bar cheese and sour cream
and washed down with Martinelli’s sparkling cider.

In my final moments I’d reflect on how Luther Burbank
began with the seeds of an Early Rose potato plant
and worked for years to breed the awesome tuber
that has come to be called the Idaho Baker.

And I’d feel sad as I meditated on how
the brilliant but impoverished Burbank
had to sell his tater masterpiece to a tycoon
named J H Gregory for $150!

For forty years the world’s potato scientists
(and yes, there are such people)
have worked to improve the Idaho Russet
and have failed to find a serious contender.

When I’m finally executed for my crimes of inanity
and ascend to the ‘Heaven for the Misunderstood’
I’ll dine on the manna from planet Earth,
the humble but delectable Burbank Russet potato.

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To Sneeze Or Not To Sneeze

To Sneeze or Not to Sneeze
(with apologies to William Shakespeare)


To sneeze or not to sneeze, that is the question.
Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer
A runny nose and congested head
Or to have qualms against a sea of herbal teas
And by opposing them to lie, to lie awake for hours,
To sweep the covers off my feverish bod
Amid sinus headache and a thousand dirty Kleenex,
For a sneeze is air too. ‘Tis a proclamation
Snoutly to be wished. To sneeze, to blow,
To blow my nose, perchance to clear my head.
Under that pillow, aye, there’s my VapoRub!

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Ephemeron

People pass by,
nod their heads and
parcel half-a-thought.

People walk in
and say a few words
behind a paranoid grin.

People leave
with only a full stomach
that remembers.

People pass by
and are stunned
that their friend is gone.

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Van Buren Station

On high-back benches
weary shoppers clutch their parcels
and slump.
Wrapped in a yellow green haze
Van Buren station sleeps
beneath Chicago's vibrant streets.

Outside, on wood-plank platform
we drink-in the coffee warmth
of October's fleeting sun.

"South Chicago, 23rd, 47th, 53rd, 57th"

Like some unraveling mass of I-beam steel
the tracks begin to rumble and shake.
The slant nosed Metra comes and goes.

Across the tracks in autumn plume
Grant Park displays her rows of golden elms.
A nor’ east wind dances bow upon bow,
with a gentle sway that shears away
a sifting rain of harvest leaves.

"Park Forest South, 23rd, 47th, 53rd, 57th"

On the slant nosed Metra
I hurry home.

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Antidisestablishmentarianism

ANTIDISESTABLISHMENTARIANISM (acrostic)

A lthough I’ve attempted some difficult and
N eddlesome poems in my decades of writing,
T he ultimate challenge had to be an acrostic
I n which the longest English word was chosen.
D eciding to undergo the absurd challenge
I delved into the history of these useless words and
S oon it became abundantly clear that
E asily the most popular of the contenders,
S hellacking Shakespeare’s ‘honorificabilitudintatibus’ and
T aught to students from kindergarden to grade twelve, was
A ntidisestablishmentarianism.
B ut sadly, there were multisyllabic monsters even
L onger, like the one we came to know and love
I n Walt Disney’s 'Mary Poppins'-
S upercalifragilisticexpialidocious- which
H as fourteen syllables and a letter count of 34.
M ost linguists agree that deciding on the longest word
E ntails whether or not you allow chemical
N ames like dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane
T ypically referred to as DDT.
A nother matter is the acceptability of lingo,
R igmarole, jargon, balderdash, twaddle and 
I diomatic gibberish…
A ntidisestablishmentarianism,
N ot withstanding its pedantic appeal,
I s clearly the lexiconic choice and
S hould win the ‘Longest Word’ crown
M ade from elbow patches and Donegal tweed.

© 2009 James Rasmusson

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Doctor Jekyll

Dr. Jekyll
smart, urbane
nurturing, dreaming, scheming
inventive, anxious, lustful, violent
carousing, raping, murdering
drunken, debauched
Mr. Hyde

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Senator Foghorn



~Senator Foghorn~ (Diamante)

Statesman
honest, visionary
working, serving, caring
principled, dutiful, pragmatic, bureaucratic
wheeling, dealing, conniving
wonkish, corrupt
Politician

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There Was a Time

~There Was a Time~

There was a time when I would look
out over the azure glory of a Michigan lake,
or tear up from the umber-brown beauty
of Grand Canyon in the Arizona sun.

There was a time when I smelled
the fragrance of fresh baked bread
when east winds blessed us with the aroma
from our neighborhood bakery.

There was a time when I could hear
Elvis singing on my neighbor’s hi-fi
without the head shaking sound
of a wooferized bass.

There was a time when I hopped
aboard moving freight trains
or climbed the tallest water towers,
indifferent to the loss of life and limb.

There was a time when Doug and I slinked
through harvesting backyards
pilfering grapes and teasing dogs,
ever mindful of how long the leashes were.

There was a time when I could eat
a box of Girl Scout cookies
as I watched ‘Cavalcade of Sports’
and never gain a pound.

And there was a time when I never felt
the cold as I scurried up and down
the sledding hill at Bancroft Park
with my Flexible Flyer proudly in hand.

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A Wooden Cross

~A Wooden Cross~


South of Lafayette on interstate 65
I saw a wooden cross.

The roadside monument,
weathered and grey,
was a tribute to a loved one
who lost his life in a car crash.

At 70 mph I only saw it for an instant,
yet it was time enough to see
the cowboy hat that proudly perched
on the weathered wooden cross.

I didn’t know the cowboy nor his wife.
I didn’t attend the funeral.
But for just an instant I felt
both the sorrow and the love that poured

from the weathered wooden cross
with cowboy hat on interstate 65.