We’ll always be Jung together -

Dorothy Parker, “Collected Poems”

Times are stressful, money’s tight.

I’ve held on, truly, with all my might.

The car went first, gas so expensive.

Horse’s-ass-power walking I do, intensive.

But walk to where? – no longer to stores.

Holes in my pockets, wallet full of sores.

Oh, I still eat healthy, lots of beans -

cereal, too, nearly beyond my means.

And I seek daily for work that fits,

until I tire, cramp up, get the shits.

Oh, the wife, her mother and the dogs -

gone long ago, leaving me a pair of shoes, clogs.

But still I walk the few miles to see my shrink,

says I look healthy, not wealthy – in the pink.

He assures me worse has happened to man over time -

being poor is a social disorder, not a crime.

But to crime I must turn to pay his bill -

claims things will improve, and he needs me still.

(Published in the 7/23/10 online issue of Thick With Conviction, one of my favorites)

Note:  Just a humorous commentary on the state of financial affairs across the globe.  Rest easy: I don’t wear clogs.  And I still have dogs.  And a wife.  A shrink?  Don’t need one….yet!  This was written, as I do so often, just for fun.

as I write, between my

beloved wife and our dear

expatriate New York friends

now living the suntan life

in San Diego, e-mails flying

back and forth to choose

exactly the right cooking

course at exactly the right

place, Tuscany, of course

at precisely the right time, spring

so we can meet as a foursome

to learn how to cook spaghetti

and lasagna and pizza and

ravioli and cannelloni and cannoli

washed down with the right

wine, Italian, of course

studed and lovingly prepared

in Tuscany on tomato-spattered

stoves, sweat dropping into

the mix of whatever’ll be mixed

all ours for the price of $3995

a head, when I’d just as soon

go out and get, and I’d better

get to getting A-sap, an Italian

cookbook, one of the fancy ones

with a recipe for everything

Italian we’d ever want to eat

cook and eat, I should say

at the bargain-table price

of $50, marked down from $75

by the very same gal who’ll teach us

Italian cooking in Tuscany.

(Published in the Spring 2003 issue of Nanny Fanny Poetry Magazine)

Note:  I didn’t buy the cookbook, we took the more expensive means of learning instead.  Did we love Tuscany?  Yum-yum, how could you ask such a silly question.  Irene and friend Joanie literally looked at over 500 potential courses we might have participated in in Tuscany, finally chose the best one, offered by a young lady who lives just miles from us in Boulder – Peggy Markel, “Corso di Cucina al Focolare,” 17 miles NW of Florence.  Again, yum-yum.

loved ones who’ve moved to the clouds.

Billowy Grandma most often,

her 12-egg lemon pound cake in hand.

Fast-moving Mama, always in such

a hurry to attend to the next family duty.

Dawdling Papa, reading from a fluffy

stack of books, including the inevitable potboiler.

Brother Max, drifting erratically after

pretending to take Ritalin, disordered bipolarity.

Shrewd sister Emma, the wispy family

matriarch, asking why we’re all so middle-class.

Mysterious older brother Howard, whom I met

only three times – he now floats by weekly.

So many aunts and uncles, usually forming

overhead as if at another family reunion.

Lost friends reappearing, even threatening

bully Pete, about to rain blows on me again.

Teachers, dear teachers, never forgotten for

their wisdom, now challenging me up there.

And the dogs, all my dogs – scampering along

as if once more I’ll give chase someday.

There’s something about clouds, so familiar,

so tempting to fly up, be there with them.

(Published online in 2009 in The Stray Branch)

Note:  I often write family-friend remembrances such as this, always slightly different, especially after the loss of someone close.  A month ago, I lost sister Carolyn Patricia, beloved Patsy, who was like a surrogate mother to me and my younger siblings, Jimmy, GeeGee and Betty.  There is much to write about her and it will come soon.  She is painfully missed, by me and all of those she touched.  Farewell, Beloved Carolyn Patricia.

a thing so boring as a tree.

A tree to me, just standing there, is all you see,

arms raised to heaven, praying for rain or dog pee.

Admittedly a tree can be

quite beautiful when leaf-ed ful-ly.

But, like this poem of cursed rhyme,

a tree just stands there all the time.

Does nothing, does a tree – gives shade,

of course, with summer’s lemonade.

But shade doth fade as chill invades the glade,

dead leaves on pavement splayed.

So tell me not about its beauty, cutie.

I prefer a tree that works, is rather fruity.

Ah, here under the banana tree or apple,

with thoughts of gravity I grapple.

Ouch, what hit me on the head like lead?

‘Twas Joyce Kilmer, whom I thought dead.

Thus I promise as you snore:

Write again in rhyme? Nevermore!

(Published online in the April 2010 issue of Thick With Conviction)

Note:  Just another whimsical poem, written in rhyme to make fun of rhyme – really forcing words to rhyme, which is why the genre has nearly died out.  Never thought it would be published, but it got scooped up right away.  Go figure.

his lightbulb flashed E equals m

times c squared, accounting for

the extra energy created when neutrons

begin to multiply like radioactive rabbits

during an angry nuclear excursion.

But, sacre bleu, m stands not for mass

but for money, c for collusion, not

collision, to Albert’s embarrassment.

George Gamow also badly missed

the target when he envisioned his lewd

Big Bang Theory, aka the Beginning

of the Universe and related destinations.

What he didn’t understand was that

it was Mom and Dad who mothered and

fathered Big Bang, creating G.G. himself.

Leonardo da Vinci was so befuddled by

scientific nightmares that he painted

his most lasting enigma, the curious

smile on the placid face of Mona Lisa,

a peripatetic prostitute and soothsayer.

Mona of smiling face soothsaw that she

and Leo would get serious, freezing for-

ever that smile so beloved by multitudes

of adoring Japanese tourists to the Louvre.

My own theory, in all humbleness, is that

Albert and George and Leonardo would

have made strange bedfellows in today’s

world, their gifts to science ignored by

modern Super-Thinkers – Leonardo di

Caprio, George W. Bush and Albert

Capone, all fiduciaries of the Big Bang.

(Published on 6/21/10 online by Marquis Cafeteria Round Table)

Note:  Just a piece of fluff, the “science” of the piece garbled on purpose.  Long ago, I did attend a lecture by Mr. Big Bang himself, George Gamow, at George Washington University.  It was curious to see how a genius operates:  though brilliant, Mr. G. smoked while onstage (a no-no), didn’t know how to tie his shoes and had to have assistance to blow up a balloon.  I ran into many folks like him – and thank goodness for them! – while a consultant at the infamous Los Alamos Laboratories in New Mexico.

Like those halcyon barks of yore.

You blessed this diminished planet

With your loveliness sixteen years,

Plus a few months – a long time

In doggie years, not near enough for us.

Tears were shed, but not the overflow

Of previous losses, since you gave us

Many years of uninterrupted joy,

Coming to share your zest for living.

Wait for us, pray for us, send your

Vibrations our way so we won’t stray.

Another life awaits us – the lucky,

Chosen few, called to Doggie Heaven.

Note:  We returned from a tour of northern Spain and dear Rosie had waited for us just long enough for last goodbyes.  The most beautiful dog ever, drivers would pull up next to Irene as she walked Rosie, express their admiration of her beauty.  Beautiful in all ways, we missed her terribly but knew it was time.  A week later, we drove down to Colorado Springs to visit another rescue Australian terrier – lovely Princess – and brought her home with us.  Six years old and full of love, she looks amazingly like Rosie, with just enough difference to make a difference.  Moral to the story:  there is none.  We just figured, we needed another dog to fulfill our lives.  And remember:  you have a dog (or dogs, in our case, with nine-year-old Marco, too), then there’s reason for living….and you’ll live longer.

said Enrique, our nimble tour guide,

and who would argue with him, telling us

Spanish olive oil ranked Number One too,

much of it carted to Italy so Italianos

can slap their red-white-and-green label on it.

The Spanish speak four different languages,

each incomprehensible from the other,

making it burdensome for a tour leader

to move around easily and convey knowledge.

But it’s easy to see why the Spaniard lives

so long – he and she walk!  Walk briskly,

everywhere, striding like marathoners,

thinking while ambulatory, only good thoughts,

for frowns are rare, perhaps even forbidden.

The Catholic Church finally gave up

its Inquisitional ways long ago, and cathedrals

are everywhere, offering mass every hour

some days, the godly on strudy bent knees,

defying the church’s supplication to give it

more children, the godly more interested in

the fun part of sex rather than the reproductive.

We did see one rather young fellow in a

mechanized wheelchair, though he seemed

more interested in speed rather than recovery,

probably one of Spain’s many NASCAR nuts.

There is little fault about Spain and the Spanish -

the streets are pristine clean, the highways

uncrowded, maneuverable, the food in great

variety and tasty, the women slim and

fashionable, the men….who gives a shit?

But one fault:  few, very few, speak English.

Imagine that:  we go all the way over there,

toss our dollars at them, and they don’t speak

our language.  Makes you wonder, eh?

Note:  Irene and I are recently back from Spain – Madrid, Toledo, Avila, Salamanca, Zaragoza, Laguardia, Bilbao, and Barcelona – loving every minute of it.  Spain is clean, underpopulated, proud, polite, p0lished, and healthy, both in mind and body.  Immigrants are welcome, to do the unpleasant jobs the natives prefer to hire out.  Think about that a minute.  Their life expectancy is something like 88 years.  So, what’s wrong with us?  Nothing really, and it’s always good to return home, even after a two quick weeks.  We stayed abroad nearly ten weeks once, and I came home, kissed the ground at the airport, immediately went off for a juicy cheeseburger.  Did about the same this time, too.

in 1939, then my sister in 1941,

born in the same maternity ward,

our parents’ upstairs bedroom at

1245 35th Street in Georgetown,

northwest Washington, D.C.

I watched at Dr. Donald McDonald,

known to me as Dr. Donald Duck,

pulled first brother Jimmy from his

worn medical satchel, then sis GeeGee

from that same satchel a year and

a half later, like a magician pulls

a fluttering pigeon from his top hat.

Within a few months of GeeGee’s

arrival, the Japanese pulled their

infamous sneak attack on Pearl Harbor,

announced to us on our enormous

upright Zenith radio, causing my Dad

to cry like a baby, so Mom followed suit.

We were all crying, we kids because

earlier in the day we learned of

the passing of famous Dr. Donald Duck.

One more sister, Bee, was born three

years later, near the end of the big war,

a new doctor coming to do the honors,

no magic from his satchel, just all

business, no slight of hand – the price I paid

for being a big shot, all of eight years old.

Note:  This is a new poem, recently minted (like yesterday), to prove that the memory is still intact….though I can’t always remember where I left the car keys.  Yes, I thought babies were delivered by doctors from their worn black satchels.  Well, at least until I was eight and knew better (wink, wink).  ‘Twould be a far, far better way of knocking them out, instead of the long, tedious nine-month waiting period.  I recommend to all who read this to take up Dr. Atul Gawande’s books, especially his second one, titled Better:  A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance.  There’s a chapter later in this important book titled “The Score,” which everyone – especially all men! – should be made to read.  It’s about childbirth and it will open your eyes to some revelatory facts.  If all men read this lone chapter, the rate of childbirths in the world would plummet by at least half, within a year.  Enough said.

my mother would ruin

a perfectly good slice of cantaloupe

by dousing it with pepper

until the flesh turned black.

That was then, this is now.

Now, with age, I’ve added pepper

to my repertoire, always fresh-

ground, to season a salad,

crust a grilled steak, flavor pasta

coated with tomato-based sauce,

sprinkle liberally on fried eggs

and the side of grits, even dust

lightly the peanut butter I smear

on my toast – it adds a little s0mething!

Ah, yes, you guessed it – I have

also graduated to grinding pepper

over cantaloupe slices, till

the natural color turns charcoal.

I am, after all, my mother’s child.

(Published, I believe, in 2008 in the wonderful online magazine, Slow Trains)

Note:  My mother rained pepper on almost everything she ate, to the point where it seemed all she would taste was the pepper.  I’ve followed somewhat closely in her gustatory misstep with pepper, though not to the point of killing off all other flavor.  Funny that….don’t know if my sisters and brothers have done the same or not.  Our breakfast growing up often was a big plate of freshly cooked rice, topped with crumbled up bacon and a generous slab of butter.  Lots of salt and pepper, of course, too.  Might have been the Oklahoma (from whence my mother cameth) equivalent to cereal, the poor person’s oatmeal.  For quite a long spell there I was sure we were part Chinese.

being overrun in this out-of-control world

by a bunch of conniving schemers.

So many of us dreaming we’ll win Lotto,

snare the brass ring, have Fate smile upon us,

meet Mr. Right, be the last “Survivor,”

sing our way to stardom on a rigged

talent show, collect an Emmy or Oscar.

Better certainly to have a pipe-dream

than to hatch skullduggery, plot a scheme

like fast-dealing, damned convincing

Bernie Madoff.  Bernie’s evangelical

think-alike in my experience was a cohort

by the name of Gene Nobody, last name

concealed to protect those he duped.

Gene, even into his late fifties, had the face

of a fallen angel, the silver tongue that

made people reach for their wallet,

reap enough greenery to propel Gene into

a Ponzi scam like Bernie’s, only Gene’s

bilked from the goodness of Christian pals -

but Ponzi schemes know no religion.

Gene only separated three million from

church friends before they got wise, a trifle

compared to Bernie’s outrageous billions.

Bernie pulled 150 years, Gene only 120.

Hey, dreamers – fair is rarely fair, so there.

(Published online on 4/12/10 in the Marquis Cafeteria Round Table)

Gene Nobody is a real somebody in my life, though I haven’t seen him – just read about his current exploits in the newspapers – for thirty of more years.  We used to be neighbors, got involved in some insurance business transactions.

Why a good Christian boy – or man – like Gene chose to get involved in the ungodly life of crime (did he know what he was doing, I ask myself) is beyond me.  It’s why I write so much about human nature, often exploring the John Edwards syndrome.  People can be so puzzling.