Inspiration...a flat word in this moment
My motivation is sucked to the screen
Black and white letters are so lovely
Real colors fail to convey
I don't know where I am right now

Where has it all gone?
Perhaps it flew away
When I began to beat my head
With the club
That told me I am not good enough
Is it that I can't compete?
Or fail to even try?
But why?

So, I let it fly
Again today...
like so many other days...
And many to come

Safely I land in afternoon
With no room
For expectation
Just routine

Dead ring in his ears
Black soot on his clothes
The smell of burnt timbers
Entrenched in his nose

From old ones, and young ones, and dead ones
He ran
Small fingers gripping
A gasoline can

Through rivers of concrete
The docks and the slum
The orange horizon
The deepening hum

Beneath the cold reek
Of driftwood and crabs
He buries it deep
Though he's already mad

Panic eats mobs
As hydrates roar
He stands wide-eyed
On the glistening shore

The din of the dying
Toes wet in sand
The call of his uncle
The gasoline can

Gruff men coo
As they take him away
Between white lips
Of sheets he'll stay

A ceiling above him
A nun at his side
His twitches lost
Under empty eyes

The red-rimmed pride
As the bullies ran
The fleeting respect
Of the gasoline can

If nerves would let him
He'd gnaw off his hand
The wicked mistake
Of the gasoline can

Here's the one i wrote this morning

ConSCRIPtion Cadence

I wanna be your scrip fundraiser
I wanna get my 5 percent
I’m gonna make it nice and easy
I’m gonna nag without relent

1,2,3,4 come on down to the scrip store
1,2,3,4 -5 percent’s easy, let’s get more

I wanna get your standing order
You’re gonna be a regular
No more hiding in the corner
I’m gonna make you a scrip star

1,2,3,4 come on down to the scrip store
1,2,3,4 -5 percent’s easy, let’s get more


For those who don't know, Scrip is a fundraiser for non profits where people buy shopping gift cards through us at face value, but we pay less than face value for them. Typically the profit is 5%. I run this for my kids school. The year before me, they made $7K, last year (my first) we made $19.2K, this year I'm going for $25K. I started writing weekly scrip "news" which soon featured cheesy poems. Apparently they are popular and I get requests. this was inspired by regular.joe and his user title.

I"ve got a sore throat
Nothing can help me soothe it
what about altoids?

Altoids? are they like hemorrhoids, only higher up?

Nah, they're like a hard, supersonic mint-type thing-y. You're in Japan? You've no altoids? What about mentos?

I bet you think this poem is about you...
 

you need to grow up
you make me throw up
so get mad and blow up
the parking lot: show up

get to' up from the flo' up

The cat
sat on a mat
and said "drat"
where's my tail at?

The cat
sat on the mat
and was posted by drax

Death to small kittens
Death to red roses
Death to grown men
With snot on their noses

Death to the athletes
And those that languor
Death to all friends,
Family, and strangers

While I was using the toilet and thinking about nothing,
I noticed a gnat on the rim of the sink,
Crawling slowly across
What I’m sure was
A vast, dipping, featureless waste.

I forgot about him in the time it took me
To finish my business and zip up my pants.
I only noticed him again as I turned on the water faucet
And washed my hands.

Had he stayed put, clinging to the edge of the sink,
Impossibly confused, terrified,
He would have been all right.

But he panicked, and flew straight into the unfathomable torrent
To be washed down into the gapping abyss
And taken to the stinking land of the dead,
Where so many other hapless insects had gone before him.


I felt like God.

I looked, I could see her
She couldn’t see me
I sat at my table
I sipped at my tea

Hidden behind
A vase and its flowers
I continued to gaze
For what seemed like hours

And what if she saw me?
What then would I do?
Panic most likely –
Well, wouldn’t you?

I’d jump with a start
And have a mishap
Knock over the vase
Pour tea in my lap

Feel it burn through my trousers
Hit my tenderest place
Try hard to conceal it
Go red in the face

Then let out a cry
Of pain that’s for sure
Leap up from the table
See it crash to the floor

Catching my trousers
And hoisting them down
Left there in my boxers
A right red-faced clown.

Everyone facing me
Staring, jaws dropped
My petard well hoisted
My concealment a flop

Enough of such danger
I’ve had my fill
She’s not all THAT pretty
‘Hey waiter, the bill!.

i think
therefore i am
thinking
therefore
am i
?

yes.
you are.
...
drunk, most likely.

Cyclefrance, that was a good one. I like a poem with a punchline.