Critical Poetic License

Happily ever after, 

Do not write as if 

 

Your life’s a third-rate novel 

Where you end up 

 

Reading a biography 

You could’ve lived without. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memo Writ To A Fare-Thee-Well

Don’t forget— 

No matter what you do, how 

You do it will always come back 

To let you know how you did. 

 

 

 

A Poem Should Be (22)

Lightheaded but not 

At all incongruous— 

Like a grotesque

 

Metallic bird lunging head- 

Long into the sound 

Barrier banging against 

 

Your tin ear till 

You can hear yourself 

Heading for another universe 

 

Eons 

Of light 

Years away. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Playing For Keeps

We know 

How diverse verses come and go— 

 

The easy ones quick and eager 

To show their facile faces; the hard ones 

 

Hard at work while hiding, keeping 

Those hard-won profiles low. 

 

 

 

 

 

Discriminating Behavior

 

Like eggs gone bad, unsavory 

Politicians on their way 

To becoming rotten to the core 

Maneuver straight to the surface 

When immersed in a pot of water; 

Taken for granted and yoked 

To one another by dumb gravity, 

Their out of it constituents stay hale

And hearty stuck to the bottom. 

 

 

 

Better Luck Next Time, Yahoo

 

You asked for a poem

That would be enlightening. 

 

 

 

Down But Still Not Out

 

It’s when you feel

Troubled and out

 

Of place and the only 

Place left you can go to

 

Is the home you left 

In the first place.

 

 

 

 

Still Mellow Yellow At 76

What if 

 

I told you quite 

Rightly I fancy these small 

Yellow croci blooming 

 

By the side 

Of this narrow 

Path leading 

 

To the small white 

Chapel on the top 

Of the hill 

 

Overlooking my sun- 

Lit home village remind 

Me of a song 

 

Of my youth, would you 

Indulge me this not 

So farfetched fantasy? 

 

 

 

Catch Me If You Can, Chumps

The whereabouts of where 

Your promising poetics were 

Headed at any given time 

Were clearly present 

And defined by 

An artful aversion 

 

To working hard 

At nothing save how 

Fast and easy you could get 

In and out without 

Ever delivering 

The promised goods. 

 

 

 

 

 

Spring Haiku: Cupid's Tart

 

smitten lovebirds dart 

in and out of the bitter- 

sweet lemon tree’s heart