Saturday, April 30, 2011

 
Rocco and Jimmie Various


ROCCO
So what’s the latest, Jimmie Various? Novel? Short...?

JIMMIE
Travel essay in anthology. I scope out a few small highways
through the people alongside.

ROCCO
Could be pretty good.

JIMMIE
Times critic sniffs "The LAHST piece deals with quite minor
American roads."

ROCCO
Well, he didn't say they should’ve stayed that way!

JIMMIE
Might as well have.

ROCCO
If you were a horse, be said: "Jimmie Various also ran."

JIMMIE
That’s me all right. I wouldn't mind just being quoted a bit.
Like, my words count.

ROCCO
You’re after immortality and it keeps receding
the more you trudge.

JIMMIE
Look at Catch 22. It's said in every language of the world!

ROCCO
Yeah it is. But that’s because of its thumpingly insane atmospheric. That’s the writing part.

JIMMIE
I'll take anything I can get.

ROCCO
Then pay attention to Yeats. Didn't he say something like you ought to be satisfied to distract a young girl with a poem?

JIMMIE
Mine have distracted, I suppose.

ROCCO
Why isn't it enough? A lovely closes a book of your verse
and says That's just
beautiful!

JIMMIE
Well, I’m not writing here! That’s for sure!

ROCCO
Maybe when you're shoving up daisies in your impatient
ghinny way, you’ll think about what I’m telling you.

JIMMIE
I will. Thanks. I’ll slow down the shoving up.

Mid poseurs, Rocco encounters a real writer in South Philadelphia.

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Friday, April 29, 2011

 

Joe Heller Anticipates Today’s Republicans


-You haven't got a chance, kid. They hate Jews.

-But I'm not Jewish.

-It will make no difference. They're after everybody.*

*freely quoted from Catch 22

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Thursday, April 28, 2011

 
Law and Order in 21st Century America

Last Chapter: Branches of Government

1) LEGISLATIVE
Rubber stamps laws the lobbyists write.
Thus angling for bribes.

2) JUDICIAL
Interprets these laws according to the Constitution.
Some are Strict Constructionists, and this trying

pose somehow emerges from the legal thickets
after same Lobbyists instruct in its niceties.

3) EXECUTIVE
Enforces the dictates of such wrath-
ful power while raising those predecessors
who underwent the same corrupt bath.

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Wednesday, April 27, 2011

 
The Industrialist


-That hole up there died twenty years ago but nobody told em.

-And our operation there?

-Phasing out. Skeleton crew now.

-As the India factory grows?

-That's the formula for a brief period.

-Then?

-We raze the buildings on the beautiful Hudson! Improve the view for the time being.

-Whoa! Historic?

-They never got round to designating. Tough-ski shits-ski!
Hey we already sold the machinery to a startup in India!

-Helping a competitor?

-Not really. Our machines in India will come here...
along with the workforce.

-And into a brand new building?

-What else?

-That's what I wanna know: What else?

-India Town! Like a little Disney thing to color up the drab Hudson burg!

-Make it easy to navigate the river with all that curry stink!

-Never thought of that. Hey they bring Grandma and Grandpa
who subsist on a few beans and a handful of rice.
Instead of farting all day, let's put em to use in India Town!
Dress ‘em in gorgeous rags. That armpit’ll leap to life up there!

-It's the American Dream!

-In a way, it is!

-You'll need beggars to make it really Indian. May I suggest Americans?

-Wouldn't be genuine.

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Tuesday, April 26, 2011

 
Disgusting Acts


-She finds the act disgusting.

-Thus can a flatly uninteresting woman have an opinion.

-He's finds it quite the opposite.

-And the zombie ladies he pays have no opinions at all.

-At any rate...they’re going to therapy.

-He gives, she gives. They're discharged slightly more adult.

-Going to one of these Point of Agreement guys. They start
the couple with a point of agreement and spend hours on that
before any problem thrashed around.

-With those two, the agreeable ground is Right Wingnut Politics.

-How'd you know?

-Just a wonky guess. Listen, I'm a few beats behind the field:
Who's champion there presently?

-He calls himself “Pure-O the Constitution Man.”

-Does he now?

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Monday, April 25, 2011

 

Saying a Little Prayer

Well, where's the harm?
“Great!” sneer atheists,

“fixing you on the Super-
stition Chart ‘tween

Mumbo & Jumbo.” Locale
not worst, if noisy.

I've done rational too.
All proofs get extruded to

nonsense. Soldiers coy mid
either Bivouac in Truth.

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Sunday, April 24, 2011

 

I got in touch with my feelings,
and all that crap-- Annie Hall

-Crap nailed after
a fervent phase
of it, almost
religious. You?

-Fool, but so what? Another
vehicle slides to the curb

and all swerve apeshit.
It is, at last, the definitive

marvel! How could we
have missed it earlier?

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Saturday, April 23, 2011

 
Highschool Variety Show

Football team, in drag,
butchers a dance
to yowling laughter.

Wry Mr Peterson, Shop, labels it
"The Dance of the Eleven Whales."

The English Department, resentful
of wit displayed elsewhere, launches

caustic digs of vague allusions
against him and the performance.
In a parallel universe, the Eleven's

movement is lithe, the audience breathless and
Peterson speaks of terpsichorean brilliance.

The English Department? Well, they’re
already a parallel universe.

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Friday, April 22, 2011

 
Irish Deconstructionism

Cardboard chest of drawers
assembled without
the plan and it worked

fine--well, in its flimsy way.
Then I decided that outward-
facing tabs should toe in,

ideally. But in correcting,
found when tab A connected,

tab B popped out,
vice versa & etc etc.

& oh well you know
the whole middle class

cheapskate drill--
& its tortures.

By this sweaty time a rip
manifested itself,
minor, hardly showing.

Who could have said this
infinitesimal flaw

would lead to the frenzied
destruction of the entire

objet d’art in-
to the smallest
possible pieces?

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Thursday, April 21, 2011

 

Hypocrisy

We've all displayed, yes?
The best revealing
later shame.

In politics, it's
mothers' milk afresh.

There we must assess
less harshly. Sadly,

the hardest time today
is borne again by racists.

Thus, where's the birth
certificate of non-white
president? Trying justice.

In the Turkish proverb: If
you can't beat the donkey,
you beat the saddle.

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Wednesday, April 20, 2011

 

September and April

Searching WebMD
for symptoms.

Other sites,
home remedies.

Thus science and
Grandma. Feeling

ascendant next to youngsters
who fiddle with video games--

paying to cheat onto
gaudier levels. But

at least their attainments
have Colonial utility
in a future where

some ensconce before
gorgeous consoles to
waste peasants.

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Tuesday, April 19, 2011

 

Ex-Folkies


-Well, how does that handle feel, Vandal?

-Comfortable enough.

-Back when we dug the music, we were gonna
change the world!

-I was willing, but then Dad died and Mom wifted
to Palm Beach. Nobody was running the outfit, so
I stepped in. I mean, leave it to the bankers, brokers,
and lawyers and you’ll be raped blind.

-Amen. I never stepped out. Even when we two shared
folkie wisdom I stayed on the phone with the family.
Now the blogs want us guillotined because we pay
no taxes–-allegedly.

-It's a complex picture and you can't really explain complexity.
It operates on Faith. And bribes.

-In one seminar in grad school, prof claimed economic show
we have now is unsustainable. Something’ll detonate!

-Revolution? I expect that. But maybe in ten, fifteen years.

-I'd say sooner. Huge marches on Washington, etc.
Turning violent everywhere! And our solders
and national guardsman won't fire on...

-That's where you're wrong. Thousands killed.

-Well, you can't kill everybody.

-Wrong again. You can. What's the difference? Get rid of
the bitching work force and bring Indian units in.
Our stability will come when most of the workers
are Indian.

-Man have you gone Right!

-Just factual. And I’m not playing the Trombone of Freedom
like the charlatans.

-O the humanity!

-Wide-gauged like this, you’re in love! A boy or girl this time?

-He’s a complete heartbreaker!

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Monday, April 18, 2011

 

Futures of Pop Entertainers

Gnashers & folkies
stay malcontented
Democrats;

Toodley-Doo
Commercial
Cornballs

embrace
Republicanism,

rending anthems for
minor league baseball
& weeping on cue.

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Sunday, April 17, 2011

 
Horses

shot out from under
during the personal war

include, most obviously,
Pride. In daily skirmish,

they decline and fall
without names.

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Saturday, April 16, 2011

 

The Nanny State

She pays us
for peeing,
buying us toys.

Whereas in Nazi nurseries
she orders us when.

Enforcing, for our own good,
schedules. Followed or beaten into.

Though midst posher precincts
she’ll croon, “And how are all
my little boys and girls today?”

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Friday, April 15, 2011

 
Danielle and Andy


How can he be a Republican?
thinks Danielle, pouring his
coffee, and yet so nice
and fun? And a gentleman:

no little ass-pats in passing
back from dimming the lights.

In her cubby over the planes,
Lillian sorts out the flights

in her little rhymes. "Dainty
to Danielle," she snorts, "but
randy with Andy."

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Thursday, April 14, 2011

 
Calliope


ACCOUNTANT-1
He must be our most infantile client!

ACCOUNTANT-2
Probably. How manifested this time?

ACC-1
He heard that GE has a 227-page return and got jealous.

ACC-2
How long his?

ACC-1
A mere 114, so he wanted to add pages of deductions.

ACC-2
Already Creative Writing. We mustn’t let it be turned into Farce.

ACC-1
I told him that the more we conferred, the higher our fee.

ACC-2
That stopped him?

ACC-1
His lawyers did. Told him he was ruining an
Ignorance Defense, if Justice came after him.

ACC-2
Which will never happen. Too big to jail.
But they could seek us.

ACC-1
Same defense. Our raft of brigands, aka the legal firm of
Allsiz, Belleer, and Rancini, gave us bum advice!

ACC-2
Why it's just a Carousel of Ignorance out here!

ACC-1
Accompanied by The Calliope of Greed.

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Wednesday, April 13, 2011

 

Four AM Radio

Roswell & freak-
out Republicans.

Jesus babblers
for gross measure.

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Tuesday, April 12, 2011

 
Past kept around

only for reasons
of Catholic guilt.
Otherwise, full

speed ahead,
moderately.

Means I’ve learned
nothing? Not so.

Just don’t know
what it is yet.

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Monday, April 11, 2011

 
Summary

Endless fuck-around?

Thus do you encapsulate our last twenty years or so?
Fairly enough. The rest is eyewash.

But in the midst of your furious rant, I hear our Signature.
Why that’s all even Dr Goebbels would desire!

Signature what? Idea? Legislation?...you ask?

Just Signature. With that we have you.

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Sunday, April 10, 2011

 
I went, in desperation, to Philanthropy.
The interview:


We don’t usually fund individuals. Groups carrying on our ideals, yes. For example, we want privatized education only. Put a buck in it and fuck the unions. To put it crassly.

There’s a real return for us there, ideologically.

Now with you...? Well, there’s one way we’ll go ahead:
The Ball Vise.

You see, you’ve splashed opinions this way and that.
We require focus. The Ball Vise is a bit uncomfortable
at first, but once we get the screws set right...that’s with a capital R heh heh...you’ll be just fine for yourself and for us.

And, of course, for the Nation.

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Saturday, April 09, 2011

 
Two Inspectors


1/ But how...?

2/ How!

1/ I beg your pardon. I fail to recall that
you’re the only American Indian Inspector
in Scotland Yard.

2/ Understandable.

1/ You've solved it then?

2/ By dancing. The way I do all my cases.

1/ Who?

2/ I'll write his name.

1/ But that's my name!

2/ Doesn't the shoe fit?

1/ He...insulted my old school tie.

2/ A bounder! I saw him bounding in my dance
and you watching him from the chairs
the old ladies usually sit in.

1/ That's quite enough detail. Where do I surrender?

2/ Why right here. Scotland Yard. Unmatched facilities.

1/ I forgot they did that here.

2/ Vacant brain defense.

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Friday, April 08, 2011

 
Republican Conundrum


We’re having this little time-out. Backing up from the horrible frustration: Trouble is we can’t get the money to the wealthy fast enough.

Yeah even in the speeding cyber environment.
Our frenzy moves faster!

One of our wags suggests we shrink wrap currency
skids like Bush operatives did to begin Iraq.

Just deliver it that way. Fork lift.

Hey these people fund ghinny operas! Too gauche!--
not to mention brutal larceny enroute. (Even Dems could
get a hand in there.)

Anyway, if it don’t get delivered, it don’t get back to us!

And they say we haven’t principles! Well that’s one!

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Thursday, April 07, 2011

 

GOP Budget “Cause” Expained

Goddammit! Low Class,
Mid & Senior Moochers
gotta go with less.

What’s not clear? Truly?
Money Tree bare-branched!
Hey! Hamburger good as loin!

& the Rich? Oil ‘em!
They’re the engine!

Ah yes! Thus
stop puking,

boys & girls,
& join up!

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To Morris the Monkey, a Scientific Script

Not to Smedley, who's phlegmatic,
or Rita, who's Rita--they’ll be

controls. The little leaguers
/Cue Take Me Out to the Ballgame/

backed by this lab are
off to Puerto Rico, so, more

grant money requisite, Amigo.
/Cue Pennies From Heaven/

(All these nerd PhDs /cue Goofus/
with athletic kids!) You stole

the key to the ladies’ room,
enlisted chimp Aristophanes
/Cue Helter Skelter/

and broke into the Kotex machine,
him eating the stock. Then, unholy
pair, you ripped out the tank

mechanism of the toilet, smashed
a window, ended chasing the shriek-
ing peacocks round the reflection pool.

(I’ll not forget the full aural
chaos of that four AM phone call
from jabbering guard, Alfonso.)

/cue I Go to Pieces —discordant harmonica/

’ll cost us to remedy these mischiefs,
little Morris. But, not the reason

you're getting the cancer. Oh well…
that’s science, fresh buddy!

Someday we may even learn
what you think of us.
/cue laughter/

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Wednesday, April 06, 2011

 
Headline Style


SENATE OF CONSIGLIORES
AND HOUSE OF WHORES

MEET IN COMMITTEE

"HOW BETTER TO SERVICE BILLIONAIRES"

PATRIOTIC LIES
PRETEND OTHERWISE

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Tuesday, April 05, 2011

 
The Party of Business


wishes to inflict further disaster
upon our heads in its besotted name.

In principle anyway (cue laughter).
Screwing the worker

to a board of decreasing resonance,
and kicking Grandma to the curb
(in endless loop, for the vicious).

It's Austerity, Chums! But not
for Consiglieres, nor Godfathers

with stashes in Switzerland
and The Caymans.

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Monday, April 04, 2011

 
Kicking Grandma to the Curb


DEM
I don’t know how I feel about this.

REPUB
That’s not news. But look, I get sick of being accused in the metaphor all the time. I’m not a figure of speech! I feel like literally doing it, but I’d like your help.

DEM
Well, maybe after you really get some good ones in, I’ll just
administer a gentle, uh, leggish nudge or two.

REPUB
Symbolic, almost. You’re good at that.

Grandma enters.

GRANDMA
I didn’t get my medicine and every bone aches!

REPUB
That’s so? Well here’s something for your trouble!

Screaming ensues.

(To DEM
) You getting in on this?

DEM
Actual thumps and shrieking not as aesthetic as TV.

REPUB
I’m bushed. About broke my own ass in the process!

DEM
You got her to the curb. My input not needed, fortunately.

GRANDMA
God will punish you!

REPUB
Doubt it. It’s the Party foists the God-Malarkey.
I believe in nothing!

DEM
Rare point of agreement.

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Sunday, April 03, 2011

 
Will's Scratch


stayed open until fishing boats came in.

Everything cooked from scratch.

But now: small freezer.

“I lost my women to Walmart. They did all the slicing,
cutting, mincing, filleting the fish, shucking oysters,
and what have you.”

“You pay less than them. That's pretty lame.”

“Well, they left in tears, so maybe something else was here.”

“You know, Will, everything still tastes great. How come?”

He waves one arm along his shelf of spices.
Then taps his head.

Sears my thick steak, lost in the vapor.

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Saturday, April 02, 2011

 
Snap Course In Municipal Progress


When Marcy made Captain, she told the other detectives she could no longer be goosed. The announcement was greeted with sober applause, but none when she hinted that the horseplay should cease anyway.

Unfortunately, she became the next violator, goosing a young lieutenant who shrieked in such a feminine voice that the departmental sadist threatened to tease him forever.

But was brought up short by having his nose rearranged.
This fisticuff happened the very day the Head of Detectives expired at a Mets game.

Marcy was again promoted, and her first duty involved interviewing the splat nose, who threatened suit.
She fired him after saying he was the sorriest excuse
for a detective she ever saw.

He hied to the Chief of Police, who asked the mayor
to reign Marcy in.

His appeal was so successful that the mayor instead decided
to move Chief’s retirement up to one year from two.

This upset Chief so much he played even more golf that particular week, traveling to the state capital where a new Arnold Palmer Signature course had just opened.
Incidentally, to appeal to his cousin, a legislator.

When the legislator phoned the mayor, the locks
got changed on the Chief's office and it was given
to the press he was immediately retiring
for health reasons.

Meanwhile, Marcy was confronted by Junior Detective Lillian____to the effect that she was lodging a complaint
with The Human Relations Commission regarding the
frat boy imbecility of the department.

She showed her a cartoon her boyfriend had drawn for the newspaper showing Marcy as shepherdess against a weedy meadow. The caption: Can fading Bo Peep tame
the stubborn sheep?

After Lillian departed, Marcy took the cartoon into the bathroom and held it up beside her face.

Burst into sobs at the fat, trashy figure. After framing
it, tears splashing the glass, and hanging it in the
bathroom, she made an appointment at a spa for
the complete works.

After her first full spa day, where Harold saw her hair as the challenge of a lifetime, her new mentor in the mayor's office sent his tailor to measure her for the Chief of Police uniform!

Things were moving too fast for just about everyone, and
prior to her swearing-in, she wore the uniform to a
meeting of roiled detectives.

She apprised them of the fact that any incident of horseplay would result in the whole department being reduced to the rank of the most junior detective. Also, that the young male lieutenant was now Captain, Head of Detectives.

He proved to run a tight ship, and the wall behind Chief Marcy's desk eventually filled up with awards.

She brought out the cartoon from the bathroom
and installed it amid them.

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Friday, April 01, 2011

 
The March of Whatever

Something feels not right and the machinist stops the process
to measure with his precision micrometers. Should scrap the piece, he thinks, but work has piled up.

The mechanic who must make the part function ends up cursing and applying a few mickey mouse solutions.

The consumer receives the product, its aesthetics promising
a rare perfection.

He ends up on the phone with a person in India.

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