The Pill

The Pill

Waking up. Now I'm getting scared.

Dropped a pill.

Our kitten plays with beetles

Earnestly, and eats them. Will he think

That pill's a bug, and eat it? I'm afraid.

I'll sweep the floor.

Hopefully I'll find it.

God's a bastard. Though I dropped the pill,

He won't do a thing to help me find it.

What a nightmare if the kitten dies!

If I don't love the cats, then I love nothing.

Jesus Christ! What horror not to love!

I just got home from Denny's, and I moved

A box and saw the pill. The kitten's saved.

A cat, a man, a deity. No gods.

Not an ingrate, just a lonely man

Who keeps his mind in sync with what he sees.

Sondheim's Three Good Songs

I like three songs by Sondheim.

All came from “Follies”, one cut.

“Am I Losing My Mind?”,

“In Buddy's Eyes” and “Uptown/Downtime”,

The final one dropped.

Sondheim is now around 80.

I think I read that's what he is.

The octogenarian managed to write

Three songs that have meaning.

The man who made meaning his soul

Pleased me at lot. And the world

Wallows around in the rest.

 

Two Stanzas

Why don't you love me? It seems that you do

Sometimes. And think of the things we went through.

It seems every year you have somebody new.

I'm going crazy remembering you.

Damn the necessity! Having to work.

For all of my life little more than a clerk.

Then come the ones who are able to shirk,

Facing the world with a lie and a smirk.

 

Rhyme

I don't care whether

I'm loved or not,

Or whether my life has an

Ending or plot.

If I have a talent like

Keats, so what?
The rest on the page of my

Life is a blot.

 

Censorship

Years ago censors were vicious,

Moving with stealth and a knife.

Today although subtle they're vicious.

They only ruin your life.

Bigots of races or gods,

Political bigots defiled

The lives and ambitions and thoughts

Of Russell and Turing and Wilde.

Gibberish

Having thought the matter through

(I didn't think out loud),

The emotionally subtle few

(Like Jacqui Schiff and proud),

Do only what they want to do,

And keep the losers cowed.

That loser taking care of you

Does what he's allowed.

He has feelings – just as true -

A little less endowed -

And when you reach your hand into

His heart, he feels ashamed,

And somehow very wrong because

His spirit has been maimed.

I remember Charlie who

Came back and played the game.

Three months in psychotherapy,

The rest of him the same.

Precision

People who must do a thing

Exactly as they feel,

Never say a word too much,

And every word is real.

John the psychotherapist

Split hairs with razor blades,

Never cured a single soul,

And died himself of AIDS.

People aren't supposed to laugh,

Keep all defenses up,

Never let the low life in,

And just with Jesus sup.

Some people deem this kind of thing

Is natural and true.

Babies are all feelings, so

What would a baby do?

Like mothers and born counselors

Who do not pay their rent,

Take money they will not give back,

Their truths are heaven sent.

Out of touch, a perfect bore,

I talk a little loud,

But your money's safe with me.

Go live among the proud!

Ashamed. I never had a soul,

Inside alas I'm dead,

I have a gentler touch than she,

And I'm better read.

But gentle doesn't go for much,

And music is passe.

And what's a book? It will not make

A lonely lover stay.

 

Bookkeeping

My favorite class in college

Besides the Middle Ages

(All those blessed maniacs

And homicidal sages),

Was remedial accounting,

Which I passed and kept repeating.

I loved to see the columns

Total. Even without cheating.