"Cash"

Clive Owen never played Bond

   (is it too late to start now?)

Must be nice for beau monde

Picking their next cash cow.

October 1, 2026

"Aimless"

Poems sort symbols stored

From where our own ideas soared

Converting aimless thoughts to art

Exciting power and delight of heart.

September 28, 2026

"Some Unbidden Fire"

Not Wisdom’s lamp, but some unbidden fire

Lights up the poet’s page (and strikes him blind)

He sings of gods, of love, of Fate’s desire,

But what is that Force that impels his Mind?

As seer sees what he's yet to explore

And prophets utter truths they never planned

So verse arrives, a stranger at the door

A gift the scribbler does not understand.

The measured line, the metaphor, the rhyme

Are vessels filled by Something not his own

That speaks in tongues across the Gulf of Time

He catches words as if they have been thrown.

Thus Inspiration, wilder than the will,

Makes poets oracles against their skill.

September 25, 2026

"Instinct"

Instinct, not Wisdom, inspires the poet's quote

Just as a singer utters what he does not know

So verse arrives (as half-remembered note?)

From somewhere farther than the Self can go.

September 25, 2026

"Pride"

Like the spirit of Bashō

I wander the countryside

Looking for things to write about

   (things that prick my pride).

September 25, 2026

"Cold"

Hard to hate a five-poem day

Unless it's cold and rainy

Even then, behold the spray

Of genius bold and grainy.

September 24, 2026

"Itch"

scritch, scritch, scritch

goes the writer's pen

scratch that itch

   (whene'er you can).

September 13, 2026

"Without"

When I won the County Fair Poetry Prize

They sent over a hummingbird

When I asked her, What does it pay?

She flew off without a word.

September 8, 2026

"Stole"

Your outsized fame made you stretch

Claiming authorship of an age-old song

Return the money you stole from Ketch

   (folksters like you know the wrong).

July 13, 2026

"Sins"

The bloom is off the rose, my friend

Time for you to retire

For all your sins, now make amend

   (or face Eternal fire).

July 13, 2026

"Fooled"

He can expect class action

From legions that he's ruled

Ticketholders, fans, promoters

All those that he's fooled.

July 13, 2026

"Zero"

Never fear your hero

Won't become a zero

He'll pull a Milli Vanilli

   (with tapes from Colonie).

July 12, 2026

"Scheister"

You thought your fave tunemeister

   genius of the World

Turns out he's a scheister

   (his standard now refurled).

July 12, 2026

"Fight"

When you're tired of getting everything wrong

And you're willing to put up a fight

Just write yourself a good country song

And things should start coming out right.

June 19, 2026

"Cruelest"

April is the cruelest month

Like the poet says

But he found no rhyme for "month"

   (so he added "breeding").

March 30, 2026

"Killed"

They say it is a thriller 

But nobody ever gets killed

What it needs is a killer

To keep the rest of us thrilled.

March 21, 2026

"Lost"

When you write all your songs about houses

   (as Willie often does)

It reflects a life of lost spouses

   (and missing how it was).

March 3, 2026

"Old"

The story's been told 

   (and told and told)

The story's been told 

   (and never grows old).

January 6, 2025

"Culprit"

Whatever happened to the Big Band Era 

What would it take to bring it back

World War II, of course, was the culprit

Best we go forward (lest we backtrack).

October 31, 2025

"Difficulties"

Humphrey and Maude on an island 

When Wolf Larsen comes along

Poses particular difficulties and

Would make a good country song.

September 24, 2025