Valedictory to my online newspaper subscriptions.

 

I have always been an inveterate newspaper reader. When I was a kid my parents got the Minneapolis Star in the morning, and the Minneapolis Tribune in the evening. I devoured both -- for the comics, the movie ads (back in those days they were gigantic, garish, and promised unbridled sex and incredibly scary monsters), for stories of murder, arson, and exotic monkey business in foreign lands, and even for the  opinion pieces, which often told me things I never knew, such as the Park Board was riddled with crooks or that Mayor Art Naftalin was a saint.

When I left home to join Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey Circus as a First of May (new clown) I got a day old copy of the New York Times each day from Prince Paul, a dwarf clown. He struggled with the crossword puzzle mightily, but never completed it. So I would finish it and show it to him, just to hear his sizzling blasphemy against those fiends incarnate who designed such byzantine and misleading clues.

As a domesticated family man with many mouths to feed (eventually there were eight children) I found it behooved me to take a second part-time job, so I got up at 4 each morning to pick up, fold, and insert in plastic bags the local newspaper, and then take the station wagon around town, tossing and aiming for porches but most often sending the daily news into the forsythia.  There were always one or two papers left over -- so, as time permitted, I'd settle down in the evening, with a cup of chamomile tea to peruse the latest scandal and folly.

Ever since I retired seven years ago I've subscribed online to no less than three newspapers at a time. Not only did I read and enjoy them thoroughly, but I also began responding to some of the reporter's stories with light verse, which I called timericks. And sometimes a reporter would reply via email that they appreciated my little ditties. I guess it was a welcome change from most of the kvetching and threatening messages they were getting. I became online friends with about a dozen of 'em. 

But recently I came down with the COVID 19 virus, and after it was all over and the bills  started coming in, my modest finances (meaning Social Security) were insufficient to pay my current expenses. Something had to go.

And I'm truly sorry to say that it was my online newspaper subscriptions that I decided to let go. 

I hope all my reporter friends will understand, and forgive me for abandoning my financial support of their fine enterprises. I feel like I've betrayed one of my oldest and most trustworthy of friends . . . 

My success is God's success.

 

My success is God's success

because He is my maker.

He is not distant, unconcerned,

or merely a caretaker.

Each battle that I fight and win

He feels my triumph, too.

Each time I lose he knows my pain,

and helps me carry through.

Today's timericks.

 

Impeachment trials are just the stuff/to take our minds off things too rough/Let's bring the old boy back to growl/so we can snicker and then howl/Perhaps he'll toss his golden hair/then have a fit and throw a chair/I hope it's streamed commercial-free/so I get the full fantasy.

Investing in a Chinese group/puts you on a Loop-the-Loop/dizzy regulations mean/punters enter sight unseen/Beijing has its little whims/on the cream it always skims/So beware such foreign deals/or you'll start to miss some meals.

My keyboard's full of greasy crumbs/and stained with Snapple juice/It's sticky and will welcome bugs/I think I need to sluice/Otherwise I'll just add cheese/and bake it by and by/and then I'll have a savory/keyboard pizza pie!  

Facebook and Craig's List have got lots of junk/from moose heads to snow shoes to old steamer trunk/Shipping and handling will bring them to you/back issues galore of Judicial Review!/Beware of the hoarding of other men's rubbish/'Twill make of your domicile something quite grubbish!

A far glimpse of home

 

A far glimpse of my home so dear

through the murky atmosphere

makes me long to once again

quit the world of strife with men,

and return unto that fold

where love and light retain their hold.

Today's timericks.

 

Tesla's using bitcoin/that's the word upon the street/They bought a billion of it/making things so very sweet/for those who have it handy/while the rest of us poor slobs/still worry about mortgages and keeping our own jobs. 

The Super Bowl ads were quite funny/In fact, as examples of jest/they rate with the best of Mack Sennett/with Groucho and all of the rest/I guess as the world starts to crumble/commercials should be like Falstaff/impudent pieces of nonsense/whose purpose is to make us all laugh. 

My ice cream ain't vanilla/although it's labeled so/the stuff they're putting in it/is artificial snow/chemicals and wood pulp/preservatives and soy/I'd have to pay a fortune/to get the real mccoy. 

Today's Timericks.

 

Joe Biden, if you mean it/in bringing a new day/then robocalls you'll murder/and make them go away/I don't need car insurance/my pension is just fine/I am not buying condos/So please suppress those swine!

I knew the price of oil would jump/and I'd be gouged when at the pump/Cheap gas is soon to pass away/as OPEC gains its former sway/I'll have to sell my Subaru/and make electric scooters do!

A supermarket sushi meal/has a limited appeal/Like their cheeseballs or fried chicken/without care it makes one sicken/Rice and raw fish with seaweed/What exactly is the need?/At that price, you folks in jeans/get a case of pork & beans. 

If the Savior came today/would a face mask he display?/Would he judge those who declined/to veil their faces as maligned?/And those who spurned the new vaccine/would they be judged as unclean?/Perhaps he'd organize a posse/to make us heed the good Saint Fauci.  

I resent my ancestors/they gave me crummy genes/They made me fat and homely, so/I cannot wear nice jeans/They gave me appetites that cause/ such guilt and much distress/and a sub par intellect/that means I can't play chess/Because of this, no fam'ly charts/have been compiled by me/Because I'm way too busy with/extensive therapy.  

Photo Essay: This Week's Postcards to the President.

 

Today's timericks.

 

Somebody lifted the lid/off of the slow cooker -- drat!/The stew was still raw when we ate/Who was the darn dirty rat?/No one confessed to the crime/I quizzed ev'ryone in the house/Except, diplomatic indeed/my very own dear little spouse.

You can't have it all, Mr. Biden/when asking for Covid relief/That wage hike you wanted so badly/can no longer be your motif/You'll find as you're dealing with Congress/they're stingy on some basic rights/so pull in your horns for the moment/if you do not want the last rites.

No singing or chanting in churches/is what the Supreme Court has spoke/So we can go worship in safety/except do not utter one croak/Cuz if you are caught with a hymnal/the penalty could be extreme/a government drone just might zap you/with a discreet laser beam.

Prose Poem: A Poet Eats.

 

My uncle died and left me a whole warehouse full of canned goods.

Canned pickled beets. Canned succotash. Corned beef hash. Green beans. Water chestnuts. Sardines. Peaches. Diced tomatoes. Bully beef. Peas. Creamed corn. Golden syrup. Horse mackerel. And so on. 

All of it good until the year 2023. 

So I decided to make stews and casseroles with it all to feed starving poets.

I got a camp stove and began heating up pots of beef stew and blended cans of diced tomatoes for gazpacho and put up a sign in front of the warehouse (which, I forgot to mention, I also inherited from my uncle) that read: "FREE EATS FOR STARVING POETS."

My reason for doing this was quite cynical. 

I wanted to prove that there are no starving poets around. It's a myth.

They are all fat cats with cushy teaching jobs at universities, not emaciated artists like Knut Hamsun once wrote about.

They wouldn't show up to eat my sodium, sugar, and msg-loaded meals for all the tea in China. Not them highbrows!

(I love everybody, really, except phonies -- and there are a lot of them around.)

Nobody came the first day I did this. So I gave the food I had prepared to a group of telemarketers who worked in the next building over. They were selling time shares to condos in Hawaii.

I guess one of them knew somebody at some TV station or something, since the next day I was swamped with reporters.

By then I had installed a large oven and was baking green bean casseroles and stirring pots of slumgullion. 

I told them exactly what I was doing -- offering free meals to writers of verse. No strings attached. Eat all you want. Never a cover charge. 

Well, this got on the evening news and went viral.

And suddenly the shabby, timid, woebegone people started to trickle in.

I didn't ask them to prove they were poets. They didn't have to recite or show me their awards or degrees in English Lit. I just fed them. I figured if someone wants to call themselves a poet they have every right in the world to do so, and who's to argue it with them?

And none of them looked like prosperous and sleek university teachers, either. They all looked like a falling snowflake would knock them down for the count.

After about a week I was visited by a real gen-yew-wine professor of poetry from a nearby university. He was the real McCoy alright; he wore a black flowing cape and had a pair of pince nez pinching his nose. 

"What can I do for you, bub?" I asked him, not at all kindly. 

"I just received a twenty-thousand dollar grant to write about your fantastic enterprise, in iambic pentameter. I am here to observe your operations, in situ."

"Over my dead body" I told him, rolling up my sleeves. 

When I gave him the bum's rush out the warehouse door the crowd of tattered men and women who were eating my tuna casserole gave a cheer. 

I turned to face them, after wiping off my hands, and had to ask:

"Are any of you really writing poetry of any kind, or do you just come here for a free meal?"

A guy who looked like John Qualen came up to me, cap in hand, and said "We all have poetry in our souls, mister. Does that count?"

"Only in Harlequin novels" I replied. "Only in Hallmark Specials. But don't worry, pal -- let's open up some cans of three bean salad for good measure -- whaddya say?"

So I kept feeding these humble folk until all the canned goods were gone. Then I sold the warehouse for a tidy sum.

It turned out to be a good tax write off. 

Today's timericks.

 

My friends are very generous/when trouble's at my door/they're very glad to give advice/my faults to underscore/But should I need a ride or loan/they suddenly recall/that they must hurry off to hunt/aardvarks in Transvaal.

"Full employment!' once again is heard among the hosts/of people who grew tired of some prior empty boasts/Can Biden pull it off and bring us back prosperity?/It ought to be as easy as dividing the Red Sea . . . 

Now they say that Gerber has got toxic metals in it/along with many other brands -- now wait a goldarn minute!/I know the stuff tastes awful, but seems arsenic to me/is just a little worse than feeding babies msg/So mommies get your blenders out, and make the stuff yourself/rather than rely on poison from your grocer's shelf!