Category Archives: Poetry

Outside the Lines

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Perfection.
From a very young age,
We’re encouraged to achieve it.
Don’t go outside the lines, they tell us.
When we’re coloring our picture pages.
We are judged on how well we manage,
To stay within the little spaces.
Where the colors are unblended,
And pure right up to the lines.
But never crossing them.
Is this meant to teach us a lesson about life?
That perfection can only be attained,
If we never venture into other spaces?
Never cross the lines?
Never blend with other colors?
Maybe not consciously.
Later on we learn to accept that,
There’s no such thing as perfection.
And that all those times,
When the colors blended across the lines,
They were not mistakes, but proof of life.
That it was made by beautifully flawed,
Perfectly imperfect,
Human hands,
That cannot help,
But go outside the lines.

Christmas Belongs in December

CHRISTMAS BELONGS IN DECEMBER
We all know there’s a reason,
For stretching out the season,
It’s very clear, no discretion implied,
The market knows what sells,
They ring Pavlov’s Christmas bells,
Knowing we will open up our wallets wide,
Christmas is swell,
Carols and bells,
But bloody hell,
It’s only mid-November,
Christmas time belongs in December!
Sure I like the lights,
All those funny elves in tights,
Food and toys and candy on each shelf,
Peace, goodwill and all that stuff,
You know I just can’t get enough
But I’d rather wait until month number twelve

Les gens de la ville

Il pleut maintinent.
Il pleut dans mon coeur,
Pour les gens de la ville,
Dans la ville de la lumière,
Vivre dans la lumière de l’amour,
Avec l’amour de l’art,
L’art de la musique,
La musique du gens,
Les gens de la ville,
La ville de la culture,
La culture de l’égalité,
Fraternité et liberté.
Mais aussi la culture,
De la haine,
D’intolérance,
La violence qui pleut,
Dans les gens de la ville.

(With apologies for my bad French. Je suis désolée.)

Cat Poetry

I went to lie,
Upon the chair,
But when I did,
Your bag was there.
It’s so unfair,
Your bag being there,
Upon the chair,
And not elsewhere.
Gonna leave some hair,
Upon the chair,
The next time,
Your bag isn’t there.

Rail Rabbits

See the rail rabbits running,
Running down the tracks.
You better run,
Little rail bun,
Before the train attacks.
See the rail rabbits running,
Among the ties and stacks.
Do you live down there?
Little rail hare,
Within the platform cracks?
We weren’t always rail rabbits,
Trains always on our backs.
We lived and ran here,
Before appeared,
The station and the tracks.
We lived and ate,
And bred and died,
Right where the station is.
And we’re still here
And will be, still.
After the station disappears.

Crossings

Sierra Nevada Mountain Pass

Crossing a mountain pass,
Through the Sierra Nevada range,
Evokes memories of,
Junior high school history.
The Donner Party,
Stuck in these same mountains,
During winter.
Freezing and starving,
They soon turn to cannibalism.
No such danger of that here,
Or now, in the summertime.
Still, it’s an uneasy feeling.
Despite the overwhelming beauty,
Of the wide open countryside.
The mountains, the woods,
Pale green rolling prairies.
There is nothing here.
No houses nor farms,
Nor power lines for endless miles.
Only the road gives any clue,
That humans have been here.
And the occasional,
Open range warning sign,
With a crossing,
We see signs for deer,
Elk, cows, bulls, horses,
And even donkeys.
But none of these ventures,
Out onto the highway,
Instead, the cows graze,
In the pine forest.
And a single deer,
Looks up in surprise at the car,
From the middle of a far away field.

Problem Areas

It’s summertime, ladies.
When the living is uneasy,
For those of us with,
Problem Areas.
Those imperfect parts of us,
Endlessly discussed,
How they offend and they disgust,
And should be always hidden.
Away from view, forbidden.
Cover up your Problem Areas,
For they only want to see,
Bodies flawless and magnificent,
Smoothly plastic, prepubescent.
Wear a minimizer, for the girls.
(That’s a bra that shrinks your assets)
For nobody wants to see them,
Particularly, the men.
Who, as we know, cannot stand,
To look at women’s breasts.
So before someone arrests you,
Cover up those Problem Areas.
Contain yourself in lots of shape wear.
Suck everything in everywhere.
And never ever remind anyone,
That you’re an actual woman.

SHAKESPEARE’S HOTEL

To sleep, perchance to dream-
ay, there’s the rub,
Albeit troubled by the down
Of Satan’s ass this hotel deigns to dub
A pillow,
As if by naming it so
Those properties inherent
We expect to find
Would become apparent,
A cradle for our neck and shoulders,
Our troubled mind,
As if packing hell into a case of white
Would make it alright,
Would lead us astray
So that we then could say
A pillow, or a rose,
by any other name is just as sweet,
Though we know this analogy
To be incomplete,
For it does not encompass that we feel,
Yet cannot directly see,
The essence of quality,
From a hotel we deserve
Should it serve
To meet us in our earthly and ethereal stream,
To help us sleep,
Ay, and perchance to dream.

UNINVITED

Hey all ya’ll! Have you ever had a momentary slip  and invited someone to your party because you thought it would be a kind gesture and you sort of wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt but then after you’d invited and before the party you dug a little deeper and had a change of heart and realized you absolutely positively without a shade of doubt do not want this person anywhere near your home, your family, or your friends and you are looking for a way to make them:

UNINVITED!

“I thought that I’d invite you,
Out of kindness and respect,
I really was inclined to,
But then your views I checked,
Now I find that you’ve a mind,
Which to be kind,
Is suspect,
So please don’t bother coming,
Your name has just been “x’d”.