Poems

Don Pasquale

When youth turns up its nose at age

And men like Don Pasquale

Suffer sadly – best alone

Than with unloving spouses -

Used until there's nothing left

And gratitude's a phantom -

Beauty is the thing that counts,

And only young men have it -

9-15-13

Tiny Angels

Tiny angels round my head

When I'm cold and lying dead,

Signal Jesus in the sky

That I'm coming when I die.

This is just a fantasy

Ridiculous in poetry

That at least two thousand years

They have used to still their fears.

Now they have a world aflame

For every god that you can name.

9-15-13

 

Like My Father

A man of god who's hardly human -

And American as Jesus -

Omniscient and garrulous

On topics mortal and divine -

Like my father, prejudiced

Against each race except his own -

Where does self-survival end

And gratitude begin?
Yet compassionate and kind -

A temper and a camouflage -

9-16-13

Caustic

How remarkably unjust

Said two kind souls who never cussed

On a trip – Pahrump or bust -

Is the country they call home -

“To the ocean, white with foam” -

Said I, “Next year in New York town

The opera is shutting down -

Deceased, defunct and moribund -

The customers don't wish to fund

The opera. But tattoos, rock

And rap can make the money talk.”

Tattoos in towns in every state,

Manhattan to the Golden Gate,

On every torso, limb and pate,

Show the people hang together.

That's what makes the country great.

9-15-13