Republished with permission of Midwest Poetry Review, 1997
#RhymedSatirical
Jesus’ Brother Perturbed by earthly crimes, God… “Your brother’s failed miserably;… Have only caused more may mayhem,… Involving ugly beanies, callouse…
Ask Not Whom the Toll Bails A Grecian corpse’s mouth containe… Placed there by kin who thought he… To pay the toll required to cross… (A job that Charon got through po…
I know you mean the best for me, But why is there this urgency? If once you really had the time To praise my attributes in rhyme, I wonder if procrastination
I hate Shaw with his absurd postu… who want to get in his pants to ca… I hate Henry James for writing se… it takes a cryptologist to figure… I hate Hemingway for his drunken…
The corpse returned from war in parts, so six soldiers now appeared, jaws like fronts of trucks, determined to portray their faith in things they thought they ought to think were just. ...
I Defy the Cosmos This cosmic clutter wins no beauty… As ob-jet d’art it’s mostly gaudy… Like those on Christmas trees, ex… And kitchy rings at which the tast…
On the podium the sternest of tyra… Yet a dead one’s manic puppet, Claiming now inspired compliance. His baton a thrashing rapier, Forcing eyes to see the fire
The Jacaranda in Spring (Near Rhyme) What discount art inspired this ta… Eleven months a year you’re quite… Too dark and gaunt, we thought, to…
One moonless night in 1773 Americans, enflamed by British bu… Donned Indian face paint, boarded British ships, and gashed with hatchets
Now, the fathers, having suffered… prospering, gave unto their begotten plowshare… seeds that their begotten might also pro…
Boundaries Tracing writhing streams, circling alpine wastes, tickling out a finger nudged between two behemoths,
Old novels have their faults, but… I’m sure we’d all rush out to buy… If on the jacket lovely Hester tr… To show us all a little cleavage a… New credit cards could quickly sto…
Miniver Cheevy Rides Again or You’ve Got a Problem with That? I sew women’s gingham bonnets. I assemble covered wagons.
Kings once favored beheadings; and when it was their turn, so did angry peasants America chose a different tableau: Black hoods, elaborate nooses
Times there are in dreams and days when you behold a busy horde hastening away,