Poems

Two Kinds

If I am remembered

By posterity,

At least let it be said

Of my poesy

In hell – which is a fiction -

I was torn between

Simple pretty verses

And poems that are mean.

Babies smile at strangers.

Born gregarious -

They grow up to be bastards.

Life's a lot of fuss.

7-25-13

 

A Short Poem

He gives them all they ask,

And even whim.

They take it and give

Nothing back to him.

He is good,

And kindness is a spell.

Let god decide.

Alas there is no hell.

7-25-13

 

Transactional Analysis

I know nothing of psychology.

Yet I've the audacity to say

Transactional Analysis is stupid,

Rife with inconsistencies and flaws,

An overwhelming nonsense of the soul.

And I'm not the only one who thinks so.

The comfort of agreement! Those who think

Transactional Analysis makes sense

Are without conscience, foolish and all wise.

Who'd it cure? And who did it confuse?

I was taught it. And it tied me down.

Without it will my psyche drift away?

Taught it? Yes. I never understood it.

But I liked believing it was true.

7-24-13

 

Poems

Disinterested, pretty little poems -

Are what I've tried to write since I met Keats.

Too many things are pressing on my soul

And mean too much me, so many things

That will mean nothing in a generation,

Or tomorrow when the paper's trash.

Images and pictures and sensations -

Poems one will come to once again.

Rhythms, rhymes and music! Poetry!

And paradox. The talent and the urge

Had disappeared in 1998.

7-24-13

 

Happy Poems

Happy moods make happy poems!

Turn the country round.

Find a place for the Duartes.

(Eight feet underground.)

And the shrinks who didn't like me
Manifest with glee,

Let them say to someone strong

The things they said to me.

And the special Nancy boys

With tongues as sharp as knives,

Let social blunders, shyness and

Rejection end their lives.

Let this all occur and like

The shattering of stone,

My verse will like the Phoenix rise

And fly, as it has flown.

7-24-13

Misalliance

He made it very clear he wanted

Sex and nothing more.

He told me I was ignorant,

A psycho and a bore.

I told him quite directly that

I hadn't locked the door.

Still he lay in misery

On my vacated bed

And suffered my loquacity.

And every word I said

Geometrically increased

The torment in his head.

How it all concluded I

No longer can recall.

But I believe he farted

And escaped into the hall,

Down the stairs and out the door.

And really that was all.

7-24-13

 

Tough Love

Tough love is a euphemism.

When the patient's dead

The house of lords will analyze

What the patient said.

Writers in America

Are better known as hacks.

Dreaming up new therapies

Are educated quacks.

They said I made them look a fool.

I went there in a spell.

They called their therapy a school.

And nobody got well.

7-24-13

The Old

The young are very cruel to the old,

Throw them from the sled and let them

Perish in cold,

Mock them as they hobble down the street,

Steal their money, let them feel defeat.

The old have stories, and the young are bored.

But both of them are chosen by the lord.

The lord! And what American would want

A lord! The ruddy young, the old and gaunt!

7-24-13