Happiness

Pressure

A diver with his tubes

Underneath the sea

Has less pressure on him

Than is surrounding me.

Remedial the pressure

I've grown accustomed to.

Promises and money

And nobody who's true.

 

Jill

She doesn't like the 30s

Or 40s music'lly.

The reason for her prejudice

Isn't hard to see

In someone who's as honest

As she possibly can be.

 

Happiness

Nothing makes me happy

But a pocket full of money -

Not a lover's promises

When all of them are kept -

Not a Berlin melody

Or Verdi at his best -

Not a perfect poem

That I wrote myself -

Not a gentle lyric

By the angel named Millay -

Nor Sutherland and Callas singing

Once again for me.

Succinct

I am not laconic.

I'll mention that right now.

Details of what I'm saying

Fall like soot upon the snow.

I read one day that Junkets

Is noted just for this -

Describing every nuance

Of the subjects of his poems.

So tell the social worker

Who's listening to me

That he's visiting with Keats.

He'll say the tedium is hell.

I'm like the little girl

Of 4 or 5 or 6

Who's going to be crazy

When she's 17.