Sunday, April 03, 2022
Oh?
-Iowa got more Gambling
but Nevada got more pigs.
-You got that exactly backwards!
-Oh?
Labels: backwards, gambling, pigs, states
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
To the “Journalists”
into arguing against
His Eminence and tru-
ly becoming thus
the story.
Uh huh?
Three Card Monty:
always lose.
Labels: authority, cards, gambling, journalism, sucker, Three Card Monty
Wednesday, May 03, 2017
Princess is a bookie
Small time. Prins.
She passes on any big action
to her boyfriend, Harnaby.
Harn.
They don't gamble themselves,
except for a very occasional
hunch of Prins. College basketball,
her specialty.
Then he laughingly adds to her bet
and places it in Vegas.
It's a sucker plunge and they know
better, but occasionally pays off!
Whereupon they spend it all on a jaunt
there.
Act like tourists!
Over the years, they've made friends with
Marlesy and Ruth-Ellen, showgirls.
This time in, all have gotten tickets to
a touring Italian Opera Company.
Marlesy later prints out the arias in her own
phonetics, which they sing to each other with
great drama. Even Harn pitches in.
Naturally, the other women are frequently moved
to dance also.
Willowy and graceful, whereas Princess limps.
Labels: bookie, dance, gambling, opera, showgirl, Vegas
Saturday, January 02, 2016
Vapors
“Borne like a vapor! Can you imagine?
Her hair! Jeannie’s.”
“Yeah, but on the sweet summer air? This is
the desert. That was the Shenandoahs or
something, where you get a bit of blessed
moisture off the trees at twilight! Oh how I miss it!
Don’t you, Gramps?"
Next day, Gramps, retaining the concept of mountain,
found an alley near Commerce Street with a gray-white
smear of one at the end.
Approached Monica, hard in a black pixie cut.
“Jeannie!” implored he.
Suddenly Sheriff Dentz drove at her, red lights spinning.
“Solicitation!”
“I didn’t fuckin say Hello!”
He gave Gramps to Deputy Alice Grimes to un-babble.
“It’s pretty about the hair and everything,” she told
Chuck when he came to pick him up. “Hey! Just
happened to think: my grandma goes to a daycare
over on Painted Horse. Her hair’s not bad, and they play
cards. Poker. For money.”
“He was a shark!”
“No greenhorns there, believe me!”
“You’ve been awful nice. And I don’t wanna drop the ball
from shyness when I meet someone nice. Some coffee or
something tomorrow?”
“No wife?”
“Left a good while back.”
“Had her reasons?”
“Maybe a thousand."
“Here’s my card.”
Gramps only said in the Jeep going home that
he guessed he "went too far, bit haywire," and things
confused him, "but it’s such a lovely lovely song! I can’t
get her outa…”
“Way it goes.”
Labels: dementia, fantasy, gambling, Jeannie With the Light Brown Hair, law enforcement, obsession, prostitution, song, Stephen Foster, Western
Sunday, November 08, 2015
Ill Wind Ceasing
Alone in his plumbing office of a Monday, Hocks dreams
of throwing himself into the river to drown.
Three big jobs had been re-dos that last week, profit
out the window.
In bursts Reccles! “Pittsburgh, are you kidding?
Ten and a half points underdog and they win
by twenty! And five of our other lemons won!
BON-FREAKIN-ANZA!”
He counts out ten hundreds for Hocks onto the messy desk!
After, he pictures the Regency Hotel, on the same river he
thought to drown in. A bed piled high with classy food and
bottles of wine.
Plus Misty Tebbs.
They’re right about this dump,” coos she. “It’s been, like,
tastefully refurbished!”
Labels: football, football pool, gambling, plumbing, profit, re-do, refurbished, taste
Sunday, October 11, 2015
The Beauty Thing
Her View of Herself
J’s beauty consisted largely of makeup
meticulously applied, and a series of
tricks, some newly learned from Czech spas.
This last fad her girlfriends shared, laughing
over coffee and low cal...well, anything.
The translations proved especially gawky
on youtube.
She refused to let boyfriends see her in the
morning, setting the alarm for five.
The rest of her life consisted in buying clothes.
Her parents disagreed. Mom: so so pretty; Dad:
useless weight on the fuckin earth!
The only crises to move her was physical.
An herbal paste causing a rash along her
shoulders.
Thus, the dermatologist came on her team,
joining the plastic surgeon and others.
Her lips beset. Too thin. Injections made them
ridiculous.
J took vacation time and hid. The lips were gotten
down to large, but not absurd.
Weeks for that! her father fumed. Her mother laughed
a setback but, again, so so pretty.
One day you walk from the frame, and a young woman
takes your place.
With J, she was rather pushed from it. Transferred to
Brazil to help start a new branch, she soon graced
Rio’s beaches. But, lost mid so many younger beauties...
But not in the mind of a man who runs fleets of taxis.
He courts tirelessly, and they elope to Vegas.
In two weeks, she develops a slots problem, but he keeps her
budgeted.
They drop in on the parents before going back to Brazil.
Dad likes anyone hard-working. Mom pronounces so so pretty,
but too young to marry!
Placido doesn’t mind all the time spent on makeup and clothes.
He says she’s beautiful with or without.
He’s considered handsome in a gray-tinged way, but could
care less.
Labels: aging, beauty, beauty work, gambling, makeup, marriage, mature beauty, parents, Vegas
Sunday, June 01, 2014
Infinity Casino
Fidelity in the Neighborhood
They used the forever word.
Feeling hotly natural about it.
Thereafter, something...quirked.
Unexpected, and odd.
She shrugged: the Roulette Wheel
of Love.
He nodded, having lost standing in
the forever business.
Later, that wheel spun again.
And yet again.
Place your bets, Ladies and Gentlemen!
Labels: casino, fidelity, forever, gambling, love
Monday, December 24, 2012
At Stake
Not much up till then,
he goes all in.
But refused cards. “That
truly settles it,” he insists,
“game’s rigged!”
“Startling Revelation Depart-
ment,” sneers dealer.
Labels: all in, cards, gambling, game, rigged game
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Bat Masterson Expects Tourists
My three teams won huge
games last night. Trifecta!
Payoff emotional yet--no
gambling. Best left to pros.
My rare attempts show not
heedful scheme, but ham-
my plunge. Thus do poker
players know me.
They wait icily
for ill cues.
