The voice that launched a thousand quips
Belonged to Arnold Stang.
It now is stilled beneath the sod;
We'll miss its' urban twang.
An unpretentious fellow who lives on in memory;
A stalwart in the ranks of noble risibility.
Here's hoping that as you reside
In some good Great Unknown
They'll let you play the clown again
Into God's microphone.
Prosperity makes people think that poverty's a sin;
Just ask the man whose trousers are held up with safety pin.
Nobody buys him new clothes or will ask him how he feels
About the slips and slides he's had on Life's banana peels.
Or rather, no one listens to his sometimes loud complaints –
They must presume that silence is what makes 'em all good saints.
A house, a car, a steady job – good Christians must have these;
Otherwise they're treated like they're covered in rank fleas.
The dreamer and the poet, and those paralyzed by want,
Sup perhaps less often at the Savior's golden font
While we scramble past them with our tithes and big donations
(because it's hard to love a man more than our own Foundations.)
We all know there was Lazarus, the beggar who got crumbs –
But certainly he wasn't like our stinky modern bums!
Our exegesis tells us that the rich do not all burn;
Nor are a people saved if but too little they do earn.
There is a happy medium 'tween want and gross excess;
But still it is a game with losers, like financial chess.
Not everyone can learn the skills to finally checkmate
The storms that threaten to destroy our dreams and our estate.
Today we catch ambition like it was a modern plague—
But to some the fruits of labor seem a little vague.
We cast more stones in anger than we do bread on the water;
Even though we all do things we know we shouldn't oughter.
The poor grow ever larger, and I guess they are to blame.
The rich grow ever richer, and that too's a dirty shame.
I do not want to judge the rich and since, myself, I'm broke –
I'll wait until the next life when I'll ask: "Hey, what's the joke?"
Upon the sea shore I do walk;
The gaudy shell of size I stalk.
I find them scattered by the waves,
Nothing now but calcium graves.
Seeking large and noble shell,
I dream of starting a cartel
That hoards the bivalve brightly dyed
And the giant mollusk's pride
To sell for profit, 'twould be bliss . . .
And if I found some ambergris!
While with these dreams I am beguiled
I spot a lone and quiet child
Who picks around the dimpled sands
With small, uncertain, gentle hands.
She finds an object finally,
So little that I cannot see.
So up to her I slowly go;
For what she has I have to know.
She gladly shows me in her palm
A tiny shell that's for her mom.
She scampers off and I am struck
By thoughts that leave me in a muck.
Delusions have me in their thrall;
Tomorrow has no gold at all.
The smallest good, when done today,
Exceeds the riches of Cathay.
I, too, have got a bucket list, like in that picture show
that Nicholson and Freeman made about a year ago.
Before I kick the bucket I am hoping that email
Will falter and go offline and forever after fail.
That I can write some letters to my kids and friends abroad
And that I will receive back their responses by the wad.
I want to eat a hard-boiled egg without that sulfur smell.
I want to give a homely girl a beautiful sea shell.
I want to write a get-well card that's actually sincere.
I want to put a flea into a congressman's tin ear.
I want a pair of cashmere socks, and someone to explain
What exactly can you rhyme with something like 'plantain'.
Finally, I'd like to make an angel laugh out loud –
And hope that up in heaven they don't rule: NO JOKES ALLOWED.
Babies are a lot of trouble,
Whether girl or boy;
Gender makes no diff'rence
When you change a diaper – oy!
Then when they grow older
They have got an appetite
That either is too picky
Or will bleed your wallet white.
As an adolescent
They are drama queens & kings,
Making you impatient
To cut all the apron strings.
Finally they leave the nest
But come right back again,
This time with a boyfriend
Or a hankering for Zen.
Gender Disappointment?
That is far too nice a term.
When it comes to babies
You should treat 'em like a germ!
I'm hooked up to my Blackberry,
I'm Twittering like mad;
My iPod's got downloaded tunes
That totally are rad.
I'm texting on my cell phone
And my ring tone is Big Ben.
At Starbucks I am quite the guy;
My Wii games are Top Ten.
My laptop brings up Facebook
And a Youtube fantasy.
The only thing I cannot find
Is somebody called "me".
Uncle Jim loved ice fishing, and Hamm's beer, in that order.
He had a job and had a wife, and loved her – kinda sorter.
But when the gales of winter blew and ice formed on the lake
He wouldn't hang around the house for French fries nor a steak.
But out the door like bats from hell he'd streak with tackle box,
Putting on his parka but forgetting woolen socks.
On White Bear Lake he had his shack, a piscine sanctuary,
Where he could sit and guzzle Hamm's – he had no use for dairy.
A heater full of kerosene gave off a lethal haze,
But since he smoked a pack a day it didn't even faze.
He set his jig stick with great care, a meal worm on the hook,
Then commanded silence, for no talking would he brook.
Others might go socialize upon the icy brink;
But he was there to fish and also have a little drink.
The Hamm's flowed in at rapid pace, and here's the mystery,
No matter how much he would drink he never had to pee!
No yellow ice around his shack, just Winston butts galore;
He figured in the summer they would beautify the shore.
On Sundays when his wife and kids would always go to church
Old Uncle Jim was worshipping the crappie and the perch.
And when his wife and kids came home and thought him such a sinner,
He'd waltz in with a mess of fish and cook a big shore dinner.
I don't know how he kept his job; he was an absentee
From December 'til was time to pay his docking fee.
Perhaps his boss liked fishing, too, and wasn't so averse
to Hamm's and other beverages that men do tend to nurse.
He had a home and garden and his kids turned out all right
And though his wife looked daggers they would rarely ever fight.
Maybe it's because, come spring, when ice fishing was done
He'd stay at home, a-puttering, and chores would gladly run.
Not for him the glassy lake with boat and casting reel –
Without the snow and frostbite it did not have much appeal.
Now that he has gone to his reward, I fear that Hamm's
Will never have a customer who drinks it in such drams.
Those old Norwegians never saw their lifestyles as an error;
And wives who would put up with them are certainly much rarer!
Stranded on a dessert isle, a bunch of boys defies
Logic with their actions in the book Lord of the Flies.
A pretty crummy novel, with a pretty crummy theme,
That mimics all the antics of a high school football team.
William Golding wrote the tale to show that men are beasts
Unless they have firm government and brimstone-spouting priests.
Even though the whole thing is put up as allegory
It's got blood and guts just like a Stephen King short story.
The boys begin their journey by electing someone boss
But after that they seem to be completely at a loss.
They hunt a pig and put its head upon a sharpened stick
And what they do to fat boys ought to make you mighty sick.
Everyone wears war paint, runs around in underwear,
Beats up on his neighbor and does nothing much but swear.
Of course the kids are British which does help explain a lot;
They can never hold elections without being overwrought.
At last the boys are rescued by the noble British fleet
But not before a few of them are turned into mincemeat.
This is required reading in our colleges today—
No wonder kids would rather all those video games play.
Deep in Sherwood forest Robin Hood and Merry Men
Keep their fingers sticky stealing chimes from off Big Ben.
They shoot a bunch of arrows and they seem to be in luck
As they bring down roasted pigeons and a butchered-out roe buck.
Dressed in green, with pointy caps, and leotards as well,
No one tells them to go bathe, and brother do they smell!
They cannot stand the Sheriff so they rob his people blind,
Leaving him with nothing but a moldy old cheese rind.
Maid Marian drops in to play at cops-n-robbers, too.
The whole gang's drinking mead & ale, nobody's feeling blue.
Little John and Friar Tuck go look for merchants hoarding
Lots of gold, which Robin Hood finds exceptionally rewarding.
He robs the rich and feeds the poor and puts a bit aside
And hires smart accountants all this wampum to go hide.
Some say he is a yeoman and some say that he has rank
But none of them know anything about his offshore bank.
To maximize his profits he starts a new franchise,
Selling Sherwood woodwork and cheap archery supplies.
The sheriff and sharp Robin Hood decide they will embark
Together on a project to construct a Hoodland Park,
With rides and Friar Tuck dolls and funnel cakes galore.
Maid Marian is put in charge of every gimcrack store.
The kids get bows and arrows and feathers in their caps.
Little John makes quite a haul by selling tourist maps.
Now everyone is happy – King Richard . . . maybe not.
He got stuck with crowd control out in the parking lot.
A book that's coming back in style was written by Ayn Rand.
The plutocrats said 'twas a map unto the Promised Land.
Called Atlas Shrugged, it tells the tale of some guy, name of Galt,
Who is the modest hero, though his scotch is single malt.
The story's in the future, and we're in a pretty mess;
The public has gone Socialist – does nothing but play chess.
The government has taken over all the industry;
Everyone's got health care and good job security.
Ms Rand paints lurid pictures of the lazy, stupid crowd,
Who turn their back on Wall Street (which must never be allowed!)
So one by one the moguls who have run big companies
Take a powder, bringing folk down to their commie knees.
Without their wise experience the tides no longer lap,
The birds forget to use their wings, the trees run out of sap.
The sun no longer rises and the moon is quite erratic
And dust begins to gather in the closets and the attic.
That's when Galt, the hero, leaps into the fray at last
And shows the people CEO's must be the upper caste.
With a shout of pleasure all the people do agree
(and that's why this is fiction, not a work of history.)
This book stirred up a ruckus when it came out in the Fifties;
Ms Rand was feted as among the notables and nifties.
Exalting greed and markets free of all hidebound constraint,
Made her to all the moneybags a literary saint.
You'd think that in the interim we'd wise up just a bit,
And never fall for such self-serving novelistic ****.
But there you are, the book again is topping all the charts –
Bamboozling the youngsters and befuddling old farts.
I don't mind a stroll through cemeteries, not at all;
They're lush and green in summer and delightful in the Fall.
In winter they are bracing and provide much open space;
In springtime they abound in Mother Nature's gentle grace.
People do not walk their dogs across such hallowed ground,
So I never have to face down any rabid hound.
Thomas Gray was right to think they're peaceful and serene;
No one's hawking popcorn or cold soda with caffeine.
The lawns are tended carefully and maybe an old friend
Will have a splendid stone set up from money I did lend.
The people that you meet there do not come for any lark;
They do not act like nincompoops at some amusement park.
The weary world is distant and ambition is restrained,
Though death remains a stranger that I do not want explained.
I never dwell on what's beneath my footsteps as I trod;
Cuz I am with the living while they are with their God.
It's nice to have a place to go that's always circumspect;
A spot that's cared for tenderly when all the world is wrecked.
Just to set the record straight – it helps to be quite wary –
No matter how I look today my visit's temporary!
Bridge is not a game I play or understand at all;
People with a deck of cards who have a quiet brawl.
There's partners and a dummy and an animated bid,
and staring at each other with the cold eyes of a squid.
They open with the bidding and the double and the pass
And have no inclination for some chips or social glass.
When the auction's over they begin by taking tricks,
While underneath the table there are several stealthy kicks.
There's undertricks and over overtricks and topsy-turvy scoring
And strategies by Goren that are really quite deploring.
They're trumping one another and finessing like a cad;
The table's heating up as if it were a launching pad.
So when the game is finished friendships often are relinquished
And married couples have seen their quaint partnerships extinguished.
Gimme checkers any day, or Scrabble or Parcheesi;
I'm not playing Hamlet, I just wanna take it easy!
As the bitter winter gales creep through the stone and brick
I settle in to once again try reading Moby Dick.
In college I was told this book was greatest in the land
And reading it my intellect would suddenly expand.
I'm always up for something that will stimulate my brain
And keep it from just twirling round like some mute weathervane .
"Call me Ishmael" it begins; so far so good, I say.
The book continues with a ship that sails on Christmas day.
Captain Ahab is the man who brings aboard a crew
Whose job description is "one whale, relentlessly pursue".
This Ahab guy is not the type I'd want as supervisor;
He acts like God and Moses and has manners like the Kaiser.
Struck by lightening, with a leg chewed off by that pale whale,
The Captain's hold on common sense is really pretty frail.
There's cannibals and storms at sea and good exciting stuff,
But then the metaphysics makes the sailing pretty rough.
Melville throws in gobs of thoughts on life and death and such
And I begin to yearn for chips from bags marked as Old Dutch.
When the prose turns muddy with profound philosophy
I wonder what I'm missing on my little old TV.
But still I soldier on through chapters full of dialogue
That I suspect poor Melville wrote while drinking too much grog.
I'm halfway through the book when I do give up with a sigh;
His prose gives me a headache, is my only alibi.
And so the big thick book I put back in the cardboard box
Where it sits with chess pieces and mismatched woolen socks.
To assuage my conscience I will watch the movie version
Where Richard Basehart takes us on a nautical excursion
And Mr. Peck, the movie star, plays Captain Ahab well,
Madder than a hatter on the ocean's ceaseless swell.
I guess I will not widen my horizons for today
As I wonder if Pat Sajac uses a toupee.
The leopard cannot change its' spots.
The hide of a rhino is tough.
A snake can slough off its' old skin.
Chihuahuas go 'round in the buff.
The beasts are much smarter by far
Than we, the superior race.
They care not what color their skin
Nor put cold cream upon their face.
Cosmetics are sure for the birds.
The unvarnished truth is the best.
Perhaps if we were polka-dot
We'd give the whole skin thing a rest.
Mama cooks the turkey.
Papa carves the bird.
Grandma sets the table.
Grandpa is absurd.
Brother watches TV.
Sister's on the phone.
Auntie wants possession
Of the warm wishbone.
Uncle likes potatoes;
He hoards the gravy boat.
Nephew has a sweet tooth,
And craves a root beer float.
Cousin wants to say grace.
In-laws form a clique.
Niece says that cranberries
Will make her awful sick.
The flowers on the table
Are wax and start to melt.
All the men wish they could
Unbuckle their pants belt.
Dishes in the kitchen
Are dirty and ignored.
The old folks nod off dozing ---
The youngsters are all bored.
The football game beginning
Revives festivities.
Desert has been forgotten –
There's only frozen peas!
Someone goes for ice cream,
To loud shouts of 'hurray!'
Next year from the deli
We'll have Thanksgiving Day.
Scrooge reformed kept Christmas well, of this we have been told.
He carved a splendid turkey and was open with his gold.
No beggar from his door was turned, no reveler reviled;
The iron winter evenings at his home were all beguiled
With festive songs and dancing and a bowl of red ripe punch.
At work he gave Bob Cratchit leave to dawdle over lunch.
Old Scrooge was now a merry soul; his bank in London town
Reflected his munificence and loaned, with nothing down.
His miser's heart was dead and gone, and generosity
Made him want to share his wealth with all the bourgeoisie.
They flooded in to float a loan for homes and boats and carts;
For brewer's yeast and all the latest maritime sea charts.
'Collateral' was not a word that Scrooge let pass his lips;
He treated all his customers to plates of fish and chips.
Soon other banks were taking heed and followed where he led;
They somehow thought it was all right when all their ink ran red.
And for a while it seemed that finance would turn topsy-turvy;
Cuz no one said bad credit was akin to rabid scurvy.
Finally the bubble burst and stocks and bonds deflated
And pension plans were swooning like they had been quite sedated.
Foreclosures blossomed like the rust on shut-up factories
And people wound up living in old boxes under trees.
A scapegoat was demanded and old Scrooge was still at hand;
The government decided he had had the whole thing planned.
Like the name of Ponzi, 'Scrooge' became a deep offense
And everyone did blame him for the loss of pound and pence.
He had to go to Downing Street and beg to be acquitted.
The Cabinet to New South Wales had him quick remitted.
Now Scrooge amidst the dingoes celebrates on Christmas Day.
He carves a roasted platypus for those at his soiree.
Thus we see how goodness can bring on deep complications
Giving presidents the Nobel Prize is not too wise;
You never know what it will do to those unstable guys.
Teddy Roosevelt got one and look what happened there;
He went off shooting lions and other creatures kinda rare.
Jimmy Carter also got the nod from all those Swedes;
Now Saint Jimmy floats around while counting his prayer beads.
Our presidents are better off with scorn and stern abuse;
Otherwise they get to thinking they are mighty Zeus.
It's hard enough to keep them straight and honest all the time;
Nixon said as president his actions were no crime!
They get enough baloney from their cabinet and staff;
Believing just a fraction would make devils howl and laugh.
The only prize they ought to get, from Hollywood & Vine,
Is an Oscar for performing with intense design.
How to start explaining Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew?
A play within a play, with a misogynistic view.
A tinker starts the whole thing off; he's higher than a kite.
He thinks he is a duke attending some big opening night.
The play itself is all about a lady, name of Kate,
Who treats the men around her like a pail of stinking bait.
She must have had a childhood full of dominating males,
Cuz now when she is with them she is harder than brass nails.
The plot is very simple; there's a dowry at stake
For anyone who's 'man' enough her haughtiness to break.
Also there's Bianca, younger sister, kinda cute.
There are some Italian guys who always press their suit.
The father is a dim old bird, a toothless pantaloon.
(If I had all his money you would find me in Cancun!)
Kate must tie the knot before Bianca can be wed,
But who can duck the wicked words she hurls at every head?
Petruchio blows into town; he's looking for some loot,
And doesn't care if getting it makes him a raging brute.
He grabs poor Kate and marries her, although it's more like rape,
And then proceeds to bully her into the 'proper' shape.
The whole thing is a "comedy"; I use the word with care.
I guess five-hundred years ago this kind of stuff seemed fair.
It ends with Kate as mild as mint, as happy as a clam.
If I were that Petruchio, I'd take it on the lam.
Cuz I doubt if Kate remains as gentle as a Hobbit;
I kinda think she's reading up on old Lorena Bobbitt.
