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Friday, December 01, 2017

Some plum verses

2013
EDDIE POE STOLE YOUR PLUMS

Last night, as I wandered weary
Bored of teevee chatting cheery,
Eyelids gummy, optics bleary,
Drearily with rigid stare,
Forth my mind went glumly, dumbly,
To a small container, plumbly
Full of purple fruit, so comely
Lurking in the Frigidaire

Dare I eat them? Would it matter?
Could they make my figure fatter?
Eat I must, or be a hatter,
Madder than a marching hare!
Grabbed I they, did fairly huff them,
Cooked them I did not, nor duff them
Merely did I seek to stuff them,
Stuff them in my face, just there.

Only then my conscience teased me,
Though the stolen bounty pleased me,
Pangs of guilt straight after seized me,
Feazed me in the frigid air.
Thus, this note of explanation
Begging for some expiation
Of my sin of annexation
Of those sweet, cold fruits, so fair.

By this note, I full do blame me.
Stoop ye not to mock or shame me
Promise you will not defame me
For this midnight treat so rare!
For I suffered in that second,
Racked with purple pash unreckoned,
At those plums that lewdly beckoned,
Wishing I could grow a pear!

2011:
i
Your bag of fruit is but a pile of pits,
My feast of joy is but a pang of guilt
My still small voice is in a plague of fits,
The sweet blue juice pooled on the plate is spilt.
My snack is past, and to the trash heap comes,
And now you know that I have et your plums.
ii
Waste not your time, nor hunt in vain pursuit
Peruse, instead, this humble witness mute,
That I, regardless of your own intents
Did raid the fridge for sweet and purple fruit.
O Thou, who sought, both cleverly and wise,
To save your plums and hide them from my eyes—
Know that I—I did consume them all—
And taste them still, as I apologize.
iii
Little boy hides in the pantry alone.
Fingers and mouth of a purple-y tone.
Hush! Hush! Silence your gums!
Christopher Robin is eating your plums.
iv
Blah blah blah plums, blah blah fridge,
Blah blah blah blah sweet blah cold.

Saturday, November 18, 2017

His Dinosaurs

(Unaware that someone had gone with something similar, though different enough that I don't feel guilty now, I wrote this filk song to the tune of a radio hit by the Irish Rovers, and written by the great Shel Silverstein. It's been going through my mind, so I'm posting it here, where it will be safe from the view of all humanity. I tinkered with the words in small ways just now, because there's this thing called "scansion.")

Six thousand years back, as King James portrays,
The Lord of all created earth, in just seven days.
Made stars and trees and moons and men and animals galore,
And the biggest of them all was the dinosaur.

[chorus]
  There was mean Allosaurus, and small Dilong,
  The eagle-eyed Raptor and Pteranadon,
  The horny head Triceratops; a whole lot more:
  Almost 2k genera of dinosaur.

The Lord said to Noah, "I have to confess,
I'm going to wipe the world out, since it's turned out such a mess.
But if you'll make a boat before it rains for days two score,
You can save Man and Animal and Dinosaur."

[chorus]

The Lord told Noah to build a barge
To hold a lot of animals, some small and some large,
Said He, bring lots of kibble and build in some big doors
Tall enough and wide enough for dinosaurs...

[chorus]

So Noah cornered all the world's gopherwood
And studied God's plans and started building real good:
A boat three hundred cubits long of sturdy four-by-fours
Praying he could fit all those dinosaurs.

[chorus]

Then Noah looked and looked, and found the oddest thing
The dinosaurs were marching off in time with "Rite of Spring"
The rain commenced to falling with a mighty roar
And he just couldn't wait for no dinosaur.

[last chorus]
  So now there's mammals aplenty, and reptiles too
  Amphibians and fish and even me and you
  But if you don't include the birds that over us do soar
  You're never ever gonna see a dinosaur.


ttto: The Unicorn (Shel Silverstein)
new lyrics (c) 2007 by me

Thursday, June 08, 2017

For Thursday, June 8, 2017

Gotta type fast before this is old news and forgotten by the fickle public. 

Something detected,
Something infected,
Something for everyone:
A Comey day, tonight!

Fakers and ringers,
One with short fingers,
Something for everyone:
A Comey day, tonight!

Nothing with class, nothing with sense,
Bring down the braggart, dirty and dense!

Old situations,
New explanations
Words lose all meaning with the Right!
Tragedy tomorrow,
Comey Day tonight!

Frenzied and bitter
Bleating on Twitter,
Soaked in emoluments:
A Comey day, tonight!

Bleakly depressing
Info suppressing,
Something for columnists
A Comey day tonight!

Nothing makes sense
Nothing feels fair
Short-sighted lies pour out of his hair.
Facts leaked from trials!
Fact-free denials!
Agents from Russia in plain sight!

Bullies and whiners!
Intel and diners!
Oilmen and huskies!
Wingers and Russkies!
Sleeping dogs!
Alt-right frogs!
Cupidity!
Turgidity!
Newsbreaks!
Fakes!
Cries!
Lies!
Spinners!
Bad winners!
Mopers!
Gropers!

A COMEY DAY…
TONIGHT!

[by Kip Williams, after Stephen Sondheim]
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Sunday, February 19, 2017

Toon River Anthology, part 17

CASPER

You look like someone who could use a friend!
But never mind. If there’s one thing I’ve learned,
It’s not to go down that road. The only times
I thought it was going to work, I still got the shaft.
They went to Heaven. Yeah, Heaven! And I’m still here.
How long has it been? A century? A millennium?
So pardon me if I'm just a little bit down today.
It’ll pass. It always passes. I’ll be cheerful again. 
I’ll be a real Pollyanna, and I’ll have adventures.
As to that stone and what it implies, all I can say is:
I WISH!


HOT STUFF

Born a devil, lived a devil, died a devil.
No, not one of those tall devils, or the fat ones—
Just a little one. Cute, harmless. An imp, really.
Sometimes unexpectedly good, never evil.
Mild pranks, hijinks, tomfoolery, a hot foot or two.
I used to think I’d grow up and get big,
I’d be a regular Mephistopheles!
FEAR ME!
But no.
If anything, my belly got rounder,
And my head got cuter. Just don’t pat it, Bub,
You’ll burn your hand! (That’s devil humor.)
There was my life: It was OK. I hung with my friends,
Swiped an apple or two.
Not too good, not too bad:
Born To Raise Heck.
.

Friday, January 27, 2017

another filk

From a few years back…

YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE

You only live once, that’s how it goes.
One life and you’re gone, most evidence shows.

You live for your years, you turn your wheel
Some say you get more years; that’s not the deal 

Your life is the least the world puts on your plate
Be fast to the feast, or be late for your fate!

One life all your own, and you’re the price.
One more would be nice, but you don’t live twice

(ttto: You Only Live Twice, DUH)


[slightly revised, 2017]
.

a swinging holiday

There's a blackboard in one of my classrooms—actually both, since I take both classes in the same room on different days—with some writing on it about snowmen and whatnot. Down near the bottom, in mixed-case cursive, it says "Jungle Bells," like someone was doing the "i" and made two peaks instead of one. In a situation like that, I could (1) just ignore it, (2), fix it, or (3) do something else. I chose (3). Today, as the rest of the class was filing in, I was scribbling away:

JUNGLE BELLS

Swinging through the trees
With a holly jolly ape.
Music's on the breeze.
Native children gape!
Lights on green fronds cling
And shimmer in the heat.
Let's dance and sing till tree frogs ring
With a yuletide jungle beat! Oh—

Jungle Bells, Jungle Bells,
Through rain forests green!
Carols hum on a wooden drum
From hands that can't be seen, oh—
Jungle Bells, Jungle Bells,
Tinkle through the swamp:
Festive chimes that hang from vines
For a sultry Christmas romp!

So have a happy. The time is out of joint anyway.
.

Monday, January 23, 2017

way down upon Toon River

Freckles Friendly

A lot of people, when they talk about their life,
Say, “Sure, I did what I did. I had no choice.”
I’m not judging them, but that describes me:
The poor friend of the richest kid on earth!
What else can you do when one family
Owns everything in the county, in the state,
And the pampered heir decides that he
Has to cultivate the poorest of the poor
To show that he has the common touch?
You going to put your foot down, show your pride
And listen to your kid brother cough all night
In the leaky room you share with your folks?
So you listen to his golly-gee platitudes
And you thank him for everything you get,
No matter how trivial or useless it is.
And try your damnedest to save a little,
Shopping at the company store: lotsa luck!
And one day, maybe, you survive it all
And you escape him and go to another state,
Start your own business, and tell folks
That your last name has always been Welloff.
.

Tuesday, January 17, 2017

we need a new label

I've written a reel. Wrote it on January 11, 2017, and on the 16th, I took it to my regular Monday Irish jam group, who liked it and played it. Now I must write more, and now I have a new label for such items.

Look Away (by me)

It's copyrighted. I was going to go with Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA), but Wikipedia seemed to say that these could lead to a legal thicket, which seems like a lot to put on a poor little reel.
.