Photo from Staunton News Leader, 1936
Poetic justice
You divorced me today,
But you can’t take my words away.
My words are worth
All your penny love on this old earth.
You claim you are owed
For being subjected to my odes.
You’ll receive neither cent nor couplet—
I don’t care if penalties double it.
This divorce has no rhyme nor reason,
So, love, take a haiku for the season.
I have given you my best.
I doubt you can stanza the rest.
David E. Booker
032221
World Poetry Day
The misunderstood PPE gargles
Are related to the ancient fargles.
They live in a land
Of neither rock nor sand,
But they fit over eyes like sparkles.
These oddly named PPE gargles
Can only be worn by gargoyles.
When they sit on the edge
Of a building or ledge
The gargles give their eyes stargles.
These stargles come out in the night
When there is no moon or no light.
And only the gargoyles can see
With their gargles PPE
All the wonders and terrible frights.
Fargles were gargles of a time
When the gargoyles lived in the brine.
And all they could see
Without the fargles that be
Was the salt, the sea, and the grime.
Gargoyle with his PPE gargles
Filed under abreviation, absurdity, animals, Cartoon, fargles, fun, gargles, gargoyle, Halloween, holiday, humor, imagination, poem, poetry, PPE, Random Access Thoughts, Random thought, story poem, word play, words, writing
The blathering idiot stood in her kitchen listening to his sometime girlfriend Zelda debating with Xenia, her daughter, about which would be worse an invasion of aliens or an attack of zombies. Zelda said the invasion of aliens would be worse with their ray guns and flying saucers and killer robot armies. Xenia said it would be zombies because they looked “just like us, but would eat our brains out.”
The debate went on for another ten minutes or so, the blather idiot dozing off as he learned against the counter. Snatches of his head popping off, rotating fast, and zooming away like a flying saucer filled his snoozing, so he kept waking up.
Finally, to end the debate, they turned to him.
Domestic Dispute on a Cosmic Scale
“Which one, what?”
“Aliens?” Zelda asked.
“Or Zombies?” Xenia asked.
Now his head was really spinning. He couldn’t answer. He didn’t really care. It wasn’t even Halloween, so what did it matter?
They stared at him. He felt a rivulet of sweat run down the side of his neck.
It was like asking him to choice between toast with crunchy peanut butter and toast with smooth peanut butter. He liked them both. He also liked other things on his toast. Why did nobody even ask about the toast?
After what seemed like a day, Xenia harrumphed and left the table.
Zelda stood up, shook her head, and said, “Typical.”
She then turned and walked away from him.
That night, while sleeping along, the blathering idiot was visited by an alien ghost that told him he must decide or else. It was hard to understand the alien because of all the high-pitched tones and squeaks.
He woke up lying cross ways over his bed; it squeaked as her pulled himself around into the proper position.
When he went back to sleep, he was visited by a zombie ghost that told him, as best a zombie could, having no brain and all, that he had to use his head and make a decision. He woke up with part of his pillow in his mouth.
After that, he couldn’t sleep. He wondered if there were really aliens out there who might swoop down and invade the Earth, or even just his house. And zombies, well, while he was fairly sure they weren’t real, one could never be 100 percent sure about such things. After all, there were werewolves. He’d seen one at a carnival when he was six.
The blathering idiot went to the bathroom, and while looking in the mirror tried to figure out what was going on. He turned on the small light next to the sink and as it shined up on his face, he stared in the mirror. His pale face looked as if he had died. Pale, blank stare from empty eyes, he reached up and removed a piece of his pillow from his mouth. He then tried to speak, to say something to calm himself, but when he did, only a short squeak came out. It was then that he knew what his answer was.
He couldn’t wait to tell Zelda and Xenia. Neither could be disappointed in him.
When he got to their house, he walked inside and into the kitchen, and made his announcement. “It’s neither aliens nor zombies that I would fear,” he said. “It is alien zombies who would come to Earth, eat the Earth zombies and then starting eating the regular girls and mothers.”
First Xenia and then Zelda looked up at him and smiled. “We’re past that,” they said in unison. “Now we’re trying to figure out who would be a better kisser, an angel or a vampire? What do you think?”
The blathering idiot was about to take a flight. He rarely flew, so he was particularly concerned with the possibility of not landing, or not landing correctly. Especially with the recent spate of air traffic controllers falling asleep, discussions of Christian Armageddon/Rapture, Mayan End of Time, and general pronouncements from certain pundits that America was on the wrong track and headed for its death, he didn’t want to get caught short, though he wasn’t quite sure what short was or why getting caught short was a bad thing. Did that mean getting caught tall was a good thing? The blathering idiot was of middling height, so where did that leave him, he wondered.
The blathering idiot made all the arrangements. He wrote out a will, though he wasn’t quite sure how to test it so it could be will and testament. He made provisions for somebody to take care of his dog. He left a love note for his on again, off again, maybe again girl friend Zelda, and a few words of advice in a note for her daughter Xenia. He hoped that she would understand to definitely NOT take any wooden nickels. Though he had never seen one himself, he heard they were a bad thing. If nothing else, it might mean you’d one day reach your hand in your pocket and find you had a pocket full of splinters.
After all the other arrangements were made, there was still one the blathering idiot had not made: his epitaph. He had thought long and hard about this. What to say that would sum up his life in a few words. He spoke with different religious leaders of different faiths and even looked in several holy books, but nothing quite suited him.
He looked up epitaphs of famous people. He didn’t quite understand the one that read: “All things considered, I’d rather be in Philadelphia.” But maybe he would after he was dead. He looked at the epitaphs of the not-so-famous people in big graveyard near his house. (He did not discuss it with Zelda. Things were off again with her and what she would probably recommend would not be what he would want resting above him for eternity, particularly if her last words when they broke up were any indication.)
He asked a few of his friends. One said say something witty. Another said, why say anything at all?
As the flight time was fast approaching, in an act of desperation, the blathering idiot consulted books and documents. Over and over again, a certain set of words kept appearing. He wasn’t quite sure why there were on the pages they were on. These pages were often blank, except for these words. Maybe this was a sign. Also, he had not seen them on a gravestone before, so they might have the advantage of being one of a kind, and the blathering idiot liked the idea of being one of a kind.
The person who would have his headstone carved in the event of the inevitable looked at the words and then looked at the blathering idiot oddly. Finally, he shrugged and said, “It’s your funeral.”
THIS SPACE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK
Filed under absurdity, air, Armageddon, Blank, blathering idiot, Cartoon, Christian, End of Time, humor, imagination, Mayan, Random Access Thoughts, Rapture, satire, traffic controller, words, writing
If money were no object
Filed under blathering idiot, Cartoon, figment, humor, imagination, paycheck, satire, word play, words, writing
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