Photo: I mailed this handmade postcard to President Biden today, to send him a graphic message.

 

Today's Timericks. (Now With More Squishmallows!)

 

If you need a judge real quick/in New Jersey you'll feel sick/Magistrates are overwhelmed/by the cases they have helmed/They collapse with nervous strain/as justice goes right down the drain.

Squishmallows, a line of soft, huggable toys created in 2017, have exploded in popularity during the pandemic, thanks to social media and in particular TikTok (or “SquishTok,” as fans call it). Collectors say the stuffed animals have given them comfort in a painful year, and that hunting for them has fostered a much-needed sense of community during an extended period of isolation.  NYT. 

Squishy toys are all the rage/if you're feeling in a cage/As a comfort it sure serves/for those raw pandemic nerves/Buy one now, before the price/doubles, triples, once or twice.  

Greenland's ice sheet is too fickle/putting mankind in a pickle/When it melts (not IF, my friend)/it could mean our very end/Have we crossed the Rubicon/with global warming too far gone?

in cemeteries headstones rest/at an angle in their quest/to remember those below/who have gone on high (or low)/we are squatters in their place/running death a futile race.

Why so many crazies born and bred here?

Can it be

toxins in the water or some inner

killer bee?

Is there too much sugar and red meat in

all our meals?

Is it residue from all our driving

on bad wheels?

Lone gunmen of today are not John Wayne,

not by a mile;

they don't seem fueled by anything

except their own damn bile.

Photo Essay: Postcards Mailed to President Biden.

 

Prose Poem: A New York Minute

 

"I'll be with you in a New York minute"

I said to her on my phone,

in the lobby of a busy Federal building downtown.

Then I put my mask back on.

Suddenly whistles began to screech

and gongs began to reverberate,

like in a World War Two movie

when the sub has to crash dive.

Several people in expensive business suits

fainted dead away at my feet.

Children clung to their mothers, 

wide eyed with terror and loathing.

Two cops pinioned me to the wall.

The first cop snarled

"Caught in the act -- profiling!"

The second cop put me in handcuffs

before barking "You'll get life for this!"

I was led away to a judge, who

looked at me the way an owl

looks at a field mouse.

"I'm from New York, son"

he said sternly. "And I suppose

you don't care for our bagels, either!"

I wanted to explain, but my pro bono lawyer

advised me to throw myself on the

mercy of the court.

That was a big mistake.

I was led away to a correction facility

far away in New Jersey.

The first night they put me in a room

filled with inflated balloons;

they kept popping at random intervals.

I didn't get a wink of sleep.

Next day they fed me on nothing but

pot stickers -- with only 

fry sauce as a dip.

"This is an abomination!" I screamed

through the bars.

No one responded.

And so it continued.

I was hooked up to electrodes,

which then did nothing.

Nothing at all.

I nearly lost my mind.

Several times a week they

brought in Bob Ross to teach

me watercolors.

Now I hate the very sight

of mountains and pine trees.

After several months

I was a mere shadow of a man.

I had bags under my eyes

the size of Mount Rushmore.

But somehow I survived.

After twenty long years they released me.

"You're free to go now, friend"

said the Warden kindly,

as he gave me ten dollars

and a clean pair of socks.

He opened the gate to the outside

world. I blinked at the bright sunlight.

"Gee" I said happily, "it must be summer."

"It's hotter than a Texas pistol."

This time I got sent to 

Coney Island.  

Today's Timericks. (Featuring Deepfake!)

 

The border swelling like balloon/there is very little room/for the poor and desp'rate ones/with their daughters and their sons/No one wants them; no one cares/Not a part of world affairs/So they sit and wait -- for what?/They are merely scuttlebutt.

Have someone you want to ruin?/Deepfake does it very soon/Amateurs can use with ease/cranking out a lot of sleaze/Anyone can be a mark/with this unsigned cyber-snark/Don't believe what you can see/in this age of trickery.

Preachers, rabbis, swamis too/must persuade their pious crew/to get shots to keep them well/Do they threaten them with hell/Or just plead for common sense/from parishioners quite dense/Atheists get vaccinated/without being consecrated.

Here it comes: another tax/as your car is making tracks/ev'ry mile, you pay a fee/just to have mobility/It ain't right, and it ain't just/I'll leave my truck at home to rust!

Today's Timericks.

 

Big government is here to stay/but not how pundits like to say/Democracy and otherwise/are not the ruling macho guys/Our lives are ruled from dusk to dawn/but no one else but Amazon.

Our country's at a wonderful stage/with Space Force, but no living wage/While power fails and taps spew dirt/we now have sugar-free dessert/Although America has heart/our infrastructure falls apart.

The battle to change the rules has been reignited by a court ruling in the western city of Osaka Japan last month that awarded a former student $3,000 for “emotional distress” incurred after she was hounded out of high school because her hair wasn’t black enough. But the court controversially backed the school’s legal right to impose the rule.  (WaPo)

In Japan you must take care/to go to school with deep black hair/Otherwise you're hounded so/your education goes fallow/Courts have upheld this cruel rule/So if you're blonde, don't go to school!

Today's Timericks.

 

A nursing home is such a pleasure/residents recline at leisure/Attendants cater to their whims/working under pseudonyms/Their fees are growing ever steeper/So I'll stay home for the Grim Reaper.

If you're down in old Kentuck/you will be way out of luck/if you look cross at a cop/On your head they'll give a bop/then give you a guided tour/of the hoosegow, that's for sure!

The pork barrel is back in style/It causes congressmen to smile/Once again they're doing favors/for their district's green engravers/Calling it an 'earmark' means/they're getting back their limousines.

Elon Musk puts men to work/no matter if contagions lurk/at a Tesla plant or two/what cares he for sickly crew?/When a car from him you buy/remember those who had to die.

Down in sunny Mexico/children have no place to go/without parents anywhere/Border agents do not care/children rounded up like kine/left alone in camps to pine/Isn't this a pretty fix/all because of politics?

Here's a shout for good old MAD/a magazine that made kids glad/at the japes it gave adults/for their silly insane cults/How their artists must have chuckled/as a mutiny they suckled!

Nearly 7 million tax filers are in limbo and facing substantial delays in getting refunds so far this tax filing season, as the Internal Revenue Service struggles to keep up with the demands of issuing stimulus checks and implementing myriad tax code changes from coronavirus relief packages, including the one President Biden signed this week.  (WaPo)

Waiting on the IRS/this delay to quick address/is like waiting for the sun/a cold cinder to become/It may happen one fine day/long after we have passed away.

Market manias abound/Gold that's easy to be found/Bitcoin, NFT's, sports cards/investors hoisted by petards/insiders collect their fee/the rest of us risk poverty.

Once a bagel you have et/you're not likely to forget/just how good they chew and taste/Never let one go to waste!/I don't care just where they bake 'em/given choice, I'll always take 'em!/Even stale, I much prefer/a bagel over gold and myrrh. 

Photo Essay: More Postcards Mailed to President Joe Biden.

 

Today's Timericks. (Now with Beeple!)

 

I never use essential oils/my skin's beyond repair/where there isn't wrinkles/there is gross unwanted hair/I look more like a troll than man/with warts and wattles, too/I'd scare away the bogie man/if my face he could view!

Sightings of the thylacine/are happening now all the time/It's been extinct a hundred years/and yet it still in news appears/People see just what they want/and that's why Trump remains to haunt.

On Thursday, a digital collage of hundreds of weird, brightly colored images made by a South Carolina artist known as Beeple sold at the prestigious Christie’s auction for $69.3 million. The staggering price is the third highest ever for a work by a living artist, second only to pieces sold by art-world giants Jeff Koons and David Hockney. (WaPo)

I've been working in collage/without any entourage/My poor stuff wont fetch the price/of a fountain drink with ice/Beeple's stuff is NFT/it's digital entirely/He's no Rembrandt, that's for sure/But he makes the cash cows purr . . . 

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For those curious about NFT's, here's some further quotes from the WaPo article:

An NFT is a type of digital crypto asset. They represent a specific version of any digital file — whether it’s a song, a video game or a simple image. Using the same technology that bitcoin uses, people can “mint” NFTs, creating a record of ownership that’s spread across thousands of computers around the world that cannot be changed by anyone except the owner. It’s a way of turning a digital file into something that can be bought and sold like a physical object.

But unlike Koons’s balloon dog sculptures and Hockney’s acrylic paintings, the collage, known as “Everydays: The First 5000 Days,” is entirely digital. In effect, what the unnamed buyer bought is not very different from the photo posted at the top of this article.

What sets it apart, though, is that this specific file is an NFT, or non-fungible token. Using the same principles behind cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, NFTs allow people to claim ownership over specific digital files, be they songs, videos or static images. Beeple, whose real name is Mike Winkelmann, is the latest beneficiary of a rush into NFTs that’s a side effect of the fast-growing interest in digital currencies and the technology behind them.

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America is none too chaste/when it comes to plastic waste/Poorer countries take our trash/making mandates balderdash/Charity begins at home/but our garbage has to roam.  

Photo Essay: Postcards Mailed to President Joe Biden.