Thank you, Mountain. #givethanks

 

Thank you, Mountain,

for being you --

and letting me

be me.

Today's Timericks. #GiveThanks.

 

I'm grateful to be growing old; seniority agrees/with my inclination to sit back and take my ease/The hustle and the bustle, not to mention hurly burly/I leave with thankful heart to younger folk who get up early /There's time now for reflection and nostalgic reverie/for stories told to grandkids with their fresh credulity/I've kept my hair and all my teeth, so what more do I need/contentment to experience and happiness to breed?

If ever I was grateful, it's cuz I'm not the fowl/who's parted from his noggin around about the jowl/Dear turkey, I am sorry that you must eaten be/but in the grand scheme of things, it's better you than me!

The Unauthorized Autobiography of Me. Section Eight.

 

My family, on the Torkildson side, is descended from royalty.

Jimmy Antone had a great garage

for experiments.

It was empty most of the time,

since Mr. Antone preferred to

park his car on the street,

as did my own dad.

It was a lazy man thing;

too much trouble to open

and close

those old garage doors.

They had huge groaning springs

and byzantine hinges like a

drawbridge. 

They'd give Tarzan a hernia.

So in the Antone garage we brought

our spoils from the nearby railyard

to fiddle with.

I specialized in half burnt flares.

Naturally. Since I always

inclined towards pyromania.

Ronny Antone contributed a two foot

steel pipe.

We plugged up one end with gravel.

I stuffed it full of sulfur from the flares.

Jimmy Antone lit it with the forbidden

matches he carried around 

furtively like a cartoon

anarchist with a bomb

at a parade.

It roared to life

wanting to suffocate

us dumb kids.

But we were so dumb

we kept the garage door 

wide open --

cuz we were lazy, too --

and the violent fumes floated

harmlessly away.

Laid on bricks,

the steel pipe turned red,

then yellow, then blue

from the heat of the dripping

sulfur.

We roasted stones in the flame.

Mad alchemists.

Until they cracked and flew apart.

The heat and the glow

and the fumes gathering

near the roof

produced an unhealthy

excitement.

A callous disregard 

for the life of small animals.

"Let's try a squirrel"

suggested Jimmy Antone

with a Boris Karloff leer.

Just then

Mrs. Antone

came out

of her kitchen

to investigate.

She denounced us

in ringing tones:

"You kids have got to be the worst bunch of idiots

this side of the river! Dammit, Ronnie, you're 

supposed to be old enough to keep your little brother

out of trouble! Wait until your father gets home. Wait

until I tell your mother, Timmy! Just wait until I get

my hairbrush! Burn down the whole neighborhood --

that's what you're doing! Put that thing out! Bring me

the hose, Ronnie! Look at the garage floor. You've ruined

it! Where in the Sam Hill did you get that all that junk from? 

Did you steal it? Have you kids been STEALING? Wait 

until your father gets home! Just wait! That's all I can

say -- just wait!"

I decided not to wait.

I ran home and told mom

that Jimmy Antone was

playing with matches.

She told Mrs. Antone,

and in the ensuing hullabaloo

my part in the Great Sulfur Scandal

was forgotten.

I may be a dumb kid

but I know how to protect

my own tush. 

Today's Timericks.

 

I'm grateful to my critics/whose constant carping tongue/have kept me trying harder/and feeling mighty young/Their petty commentaries/though obvious and flat/have tightened up my writing/improving my format.

Americans are yearning/to visit home again/to sacrifice a turkey/to goodwill among men/these altars to indulgence/must now abandoned stay/unless to spread a virus/becomes the Yankee way.

The government is tracking/my whereabouts by phone/I wish they'd stop their snooping/and leave me all alone/The data they're collecting/will blow up in their face/when I reverse the process/and their phones start to trace!

Those data mine claim jumpers/near San Francisco Bay/are too big for their britches/and need a good fillet/Europe's got their number/and cuts them down to size/But Uncle Sam won't step up/and look them in the eyes.

The Congress of Peru/is twisted as a screw/Despite their diatribes/they all take massive bribes/The janitors alone/no perks are ever thrown.

Today's timericks.

 

In the early morning hours I am bright and keen/ambition at the ready, I have no need for caffeine/But when it's post meridian, I'm running out of steam/my eyes will not stay focused and my brain feels like whipped cream/so if you want me at my best, consult me at the dawn/otherwise just be prepared for one long sleepy yawn.

Hot sauce makers have my thanks/for making life complete/with a bit of garlic or the Thai version so sweet/Cholula with it's wooden stopper/tops my spicy list/my taste buds crave its warm embrace/for a burning tryst!

Though I guess he won't concede/Trump no longer will impede/Biden's Oval Office slide/tho his tweets remain quite snide/took him long enough, by gum/to inform his lousy scrum.

Deck the halls with spotlights screaming/pink flamingoes should be teeming/snowmen big as brontosaurus/Put up ankhs or even Horus/when the light bill does come due/like Santa you'll be up the flue!

The Unauthorized Autobiography of Me. Section Seven.

 

There are mysterious items

in the landscape that I never

quite figure out.

Those dull olive green

mailboxes without a slot.

What are they for?

The mailman keeps his lunch in them.

Or an umbrella. Galoshes.

An apparatus to communicate

emergencies

to Headquarters via shortwave:

"We have a Code Red --

a little kid nosing around.

Repeat, nosing around.

Should I take him out?"

Stuck to the side of my house

like a lamprey eel

is the baffling glass bubble

with tiny arrows spinning around

and around.

Around and around,

slow and fast.

Never stopping.

Round and round she goes

and where she stops

nobody knows.

What do we win

if they do stop? 

A trip to Hawaii

I betcha.

Or a pink Cadillac

for my dad to drive to

work at Aarone's Bar & Grill.

Or will it simply dispense

Green Stamps?

Most intriguing and sinister of all

are the grates and 

manhole covers.

They must lead to

Pellucidar.

To the abode of 

the Morlocks.

To the Comstock Lode.

I peer into them for

hours

for signs of life.

"Stop fiddling with that

manhole cover! You want

to crush your fingers?"

I saw an iron manhole cover

lifted up with a crowbar.

So now I know the Open Sesame.

Where to get one . . . 

Wayne Matsuura's dad must have one.

He has everything that's useful

in his garage.

I badger Wayne

until he finds a small one 

hanging on the pegboard. 
Now he and I will unravel

underground wonders

and terrors

that will turn people's

teeth blue.

But before we get started

there's a summer cloudburst.

The storm water sewer system

goes into backwash mode

and two-hundred pound

cast iron manhole covers

pop out of the ground like

champagne corks.

Following by geysers

of filthy water.

An apocalyptic warning

for two little boys

to put the crowbar back

go inside

and watch 

My Mother the Car. 

The Unauthorized Autobiography of Me. Section Six.

 

Earworms.

I was infected at a young age.

Poet and Peasant overture.

Second Hungarian Rhapsody.

The Last Spring.

Radetzky March.

Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana.

Never Mind the Why and Wherefore.

Hungarian Dance Number Five.

The television spouted this music

as Bugs Bunny and Woody Woodpecker

cavorted; the tunes tunneling into

my brain.

John Williams frostily narrating ads for

the Longines Symphonette records,

inviting me, a dumb five year old,

to let the melodies wash nakedly 

over me.

It's a wonder my parents

didn't notice my musical

orgasms. 

Or maybe they did --

and kept silent,

mourning my corrupt

and elfin ways.

There is a goofy musical bridge

in Saps at Sea

when Stan runs over Ollie

with their model T.

It is an elegy played on

discordant flutes

for every grimace

that every clown

has ever made

in frustration

at the callousness

of fate.

Every note of that

inconsequential ditty

corrosively etched on

my default memory --

automatically playing in

a loop whenever I'm bored

with a book, a person, a movie.

As a first of may at Ringling

I put in a dozen appearances

during the three hour show.

Clown alley far from the entrance,

I had to remember dozens of musical cues

 to prepare

props and get into place for the big

production numbers.

My blood boiled with joy

in the ring gags

as the strident music

took me off this planet

full of woe and gravity

to a place where ethereal

beings swatted each other

with cricket bats.

Those raucous gallops, polkas, and screamers

still haunt the fringes of my mind,

invading my sleep with slide trombones

and siren whistles. I wake up,

ready to do a buster.

To take a header into a shaving cream pie.

Ah, these old bones won't stand

any more pratfalls.  

But come the Resurrection,

come that hilarious rebirth,

I'll be doing 108's with Ben Turpin

in front of the Throne of God.

While angelic instruments play

the Mosquito Parade March. 

Today's timericks.

 

I trust doctors, yessirree/those who sport a real MD/they have studied long enough/that they really know their stuff/but the age of quacks ain't done/still gouging us with their end run/I hope they treat themselves one day/and justly choke then pass away.

Facebook ads ubiquitous/I believe iniquitous/I can't find a single post/without some commercial host/all my friends and fam'ly gone/replaced by stinkin' Papa John!

There is not another joy/like China as our whipping boy/politicians love attacks/on that country with an axe/Someday do not be surprised/when Beijing has mobilized/and another war begins/for our leaders' hawkish sins.

Black Friday shopping at the malls will record breaking be/as addle-pated shoppers show a low down apathy/to social distancing and masks, so caught up in their greed/they're gifting COVID-19 with more liberty to breed!

Do not panic; do not sweat/you will beat that turkey yet/it might burn or never thaw/or turn into some turkey slaw/serve up wine and highballs till/all your guests are feeling ill/then they'll eat most anything/including their own napkin ring!

This day China has announced/poverty has just been trounced/No more homeless paupers drift/in the markets to shoplift/All are fed, and housed, and clean/Ev'ry hut with TV screen/Freedom, on the other hand/is pretty ragged by command.

The Unauthorized Autobiography of Me. Section Five.

 

In 1965 I introduced John Lennon to this pile of Norwegian wood,

and then he wrote the song.

My sister Sue Ellen

had the largest collection

of bulk vending machine

tchotchke

in the Western Hemisphere.

She kept it in plastic one gallon

ice cream pails in the bedroom

closet we three shared.

Linda, Sue Ellen, and me.

I didn't get my own bedroom

until I was twelve

when Billy finally moved out

to marry his first wife Barbara.

Sue Ellen never let go of anything.

Trinkets. Resentments. Bad habits.

She got her trinkets at the

Red Owl supermarket

in New Brighton

where mom went shopping

every Tuesday.

A nickel in the slot 

permitted a clear plastic capsule

to pop out containing

elongated coins

tiny rubber skeletons

that glowed in the dark

plastic charm bracelet figures

cricket pinchers

keychains

little segmented hula girls

miniature plastic three note harmonicas

compasses the size of a penny.

Me, I was strictly a gumball man.

If I couldn't chew it, 

I didn't want it.

I threw away Carl Yaztrzemski

and Hank Aaron 

baseball cards to chaw

contentedly 

on brittle pink strips

of god knows what --

it couldn't have been chicle,

since it shattered like glass.

Ah, if I only had had

the miserly instinct of my

sister --

I would now be rolling in wealth

commanding my chef

to put canned anchovies

on my Totino's frozen pizza.

Drinking Bobby Burns

Black Cherry Soda

until it poured out my ears.

Tossing Sputnik bubblegum balls

and Atomic Fireballs 

to the adoring crowds

instead of spending a

miserable old age

mumbling on soda crackers

and Bongard's Processed American cheese

from the CFSP.

Gather ye baubles while

ye may.

When my mother made tuna salad, I went on a hunger strike

that lasted for years.

The Unauthorized Autobiography of Me. Section Four.

 

"Helluva tale. Sounds like the kind of mystery and mischief I was drawn to as a 9 y/o"

Christopher Mele.  Senior Staff Editor, New York Times. 

A brigade of large elm trees

stands at attention along 19th Avenue Southeast.

They are my trees.

I have a right to them.

They give me bark 

to stack miniature rustic cabins with.

They whisper raspy nonsense to me

in the long summer breeze.

In winter their austere pattern

of branches against the slate sky

forms a blank bleak stained glass window.

Black carpenter ants busy themselves

crawling endlessly up and down their

trunks on business so important they

do not stop to succor a

fellow ant when I incinerate

it with my magnifying glass.

Dried elm leaves smell like mummies in

a hayloft.

Rain dropped and filtered

 through elm leaves

tastes of melancholy.

Baby robins fall from their

elm tree nests in the spring

to leer at me with the grotesque

mask of death. Their huge

black eyes shut,

never to open.

The elms have devious roots

that upset the sidewalk slabs

rendering my roller skates useless.

Harshly the smoke of fallen elm leaves

burning on my front lawn

snakes through the neighborhood

snakes around the elm trunks

erasing homes, cars, people --

isolating me in a smothered silence

like an episode of the Twilight Zone.

Out of this spectral fog

leaps Wayne Matsuura

to push me into a red currant bush,

yelling "Gotcha!" 

Bleeding red currant juice

I curse him with childish fervor:

"You dopehead! You scared a brownie

out of me!"

Laughing uproariously

we scuffle in the ash of elm leaves.