Poet’s Last Word

Oh, where in the world can your poet run
When the words fall flat, and the rhymes won’t come?
Oh, what hard trials arise to squash younglet poetry,
Like a weeded up, oak-wilt, unlovely and broken tree?
No thesaurus, no dictionary, nor dog-paged Bartlett’s
Can save a poor rhymester when the scansion he forgets.
Arched over his blank page, a pen rusting in his hand,
He remembers clever phrasing that once lofted grand.
But today, too many hours passed, when imagery faded away:
No paragraphs soar to shine, no dark truths for a heart to sway.
Just letters on a keyboard accompany the page gleaming white—
Is it old age, or a brain cancer, or Alzheimer’s that’s blanked his inner sight?
Swirling leaves, the pelting rain; no, just tears to wet another empty page.
Crashing thunder, volcanic explosions; no, just writer’s blocked impotent rage.
Was all this alleged talent just Life’s joke on the unwittingly absurd?
What do you say to the one who cannot find the poet’s last word?

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A Rainy Spring Weekend

So, have you decided to come on over
And do some boy and girl things:
Consume Moon Pies while making eyes
Listening to records as the hippy gypsie sings?
We could walk down to the gulch;
Maybe even while holding hands,
Traipsing along while wrenching a song
From one of our favorite rock and roll bands.
I like the Stones and Zeppelin.
Yeah, Taylor Swift is totally cool—
I like ‘Blank Space’ and her girly-girly face,
Just wisht she’d finally find a suitable fool.
But, down pours them Spring rains
And our Sophomore finals are coming fast.
My Dad says I have to make A’s,
So seems Sunday’s schedule is cast.
Maybe next weekend you can visit
And we’ll do boy and girl stuff—
Laughing at jokes like regular folks;
Seems these weekends are never long enough.