Poetry of Sardonicism

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Traffic

Four million drivers don’t turn right on red. 
Five million drivers would shoot them. 
Blood boils. Ears burn. 
Give them a honk. Ram ‘em. Push ‘em off the road. 
Speed off. Middle finger. Maniacal look of truculence. 
Road rage is a plague. 
Hope you don’t see them in church. 

The planet is host to countless maroons. 
Cut them some slack. 
The mooncalf at the salad bar
Selecting each individual leaf of lettuce. 
Choosing the finest individual sunflower seed specimens. 
He doesn’t know you just want to grab a few garbanzos
Before the blue cheese grows hair. 
What’s the deal with sunflower seeds in salad bars anyway?
Who considered this before Ponderosa hideously combusted in every suburb?

Worse, our arrogance over our “superior intellect”. 
We’ve all been guilty of messing up other lives. 
We’re the dimwits who get stuck in the EZ Pass lane with no EZ Pass. 
At least those wooden barriers snap off “easy”. 
We’re the ones who have small talk with the toll booth operator
While the nice lady behind us gives birth.

Chill, brothers and sisters, and undecideds. 
Take a poke of Manischewitz. 
Pop in a Johnny Paycheck CD. 
Chew your toothpick. 
Get out a fresh one. 
Look forward to Friday meatloaf at the home with Mom. 
Maybe she’ll recognize you. 
Better yet, maybe you’ll get extra gravy. 

Sit passively, like Switzerland. 
The conflagration surrounding you. 
Let the maroons do their thing.  

We’re all maroons.

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I Can't Draw

Condemn that professor
Who laid down the law
With abstract derision.
He said I can’t draw.

I was an art major.
My talent was raw.
I’d barely begun when
He said I can’t draw.

At first I was angry. 
It stuck in my craw,
This pompous professor
Who said I can’t draw.

I forged on to English
And God, man, and law,
Succeeded with passion.
Don’t say I can’t draw.

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The Domestic Goddess

My wife, the cleaner.
Deep and meticulous,
Innately gifted, 
Highly trained. 

Vacuum virtuoso.
Speed management,
Au fait eye, 
Gilded touch.

Dishwasher artisan.
Glasses on top,
Wedging odd items, 
Glove-like fit.

Soap precision.
Pot scrubber, 
Quick-wash, 
Power save.

Laundry genius.
Loading phenom, 
Optimum settings,
Temperature perfection.

Dryer transition,
Dials and settings,
Load and material,
Stunning fluidity. 

Domiciliary dominance.

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The Oafish Curmudgeon

I know golf, 
its exigent aspects,
its lingo,
its subtleties.

Effortlessly 
loading clubs 
onto the EZ-Go,
securing the bag.

Skillfully orienting
the twelve-pack--
optimized access,
minimized movement.

New York cab hailing flair.
Summoning the beer girl
after consuming the twelve,
hole five.

Careful planning.
Ten dollars ensures
her timely return,
hole six.

Churchillian oratory.
Shanking a wedge,
eloquently spewing 
all known expletives.

Weiner savvy after nine.
Mustard under the dog. 
Yellow nosed ignorami 
apply it above. 

Links lord.

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Supermarket Setbacks

Western civilization in decline.
A hundred years--up in smoke,
Leaders off the rails,
Advancing decrepitude of the human race.

Even if I manage to to avoid terrorist attacks,
Lake Erie walleye mercury poisoning,
And the effects of a degenerate lifestyle,
I’ll hopefully croak before it hits the fan.

Go no further than the supermarket for indicia of the end of our once proud species.

I ALWAYS select the slowest check-out line. 
No strategic convention ensures my smooth cruise past the gum, Red Bull, and celeb rags, 
My plan always savagely thwarted
By the many ubiquitous offenders.

Joe’s total is fourteen dollars and sixty-eight cents. 
He hands over a ten and a five.
The cashier carefully counts it and enters the data. 
The register reports she should return thirty-two cents.

She ponders this math challenge, 
Lips moving as she thinks through the solution, 
Then haltingly slides a quarter, a nickel, and three… no… two pennies out of the drawer. 
Triple checking for accuracy, she arranges the coins from large to small and date of minting.

Joe reaches out for the coins and…DRAT! 
With a pump fake that would make Tom Brady drool, 
Joe withdraws his hand, points his finger skyward toward the stained ceiling tiles, and proclaims...
“Wait a minute! I might have the exact change!”
He MIGHT??? 
Will his life falter by having to weigh himself down with FOUR MORE COINS?
Will the very fiber of the universe suffer irreparable harm
If he doesn’t deliver the DEFINITIVE DUCATS?

So dig he does—into every orifice of his green plaid polyester J.C. Penny suit,
Deeper and deeper, appearing at times to be exploring areas better left alone in public,
Fumbling through odd pieces of Certs, toenail clippers, keys, tiny Dunkin’ Donut receipts,
Used dental floss, and I-don’t-want-to-know-what-else.

I just want to 
Throw all the cash I have at this train wreck 
And beg that they please just split it... 
And end this horrendous nightmare.

Not until the tally is determined 
Does Margaret commence the check-writing ceremony. 
She exhumes her purse from the bottom of the shopping cart,
Carefully orienting it on the counter.

In a ritual compared to which a Greek Orthodox wedding seems fleeting, 
She patiently proceeds with a carefully scripted fifteen move process 
Of extracting her billfold and manipulating seemingly infinite snaps, flaps, folds,and pockets,
To the end of extracting her checkbook.

The painful process proceeds 
To the ultimate check writing, every letter and number formed in perfect Verdana script...
With the meticulous care one would have thought reserved for the crafting of a Faberge Egg.
The world is no longer turning.

She completes this work of art
With a signature fashioned as if to remain for an eternity
On the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel...
M-a-r-g-a-r-e-t L-o-u-i-s-e G-a-v-i-n-s-e-n-t-h-r-a-l-l-e-r-b-e-r-g-s–m-i-t-h-s-k-i.

Just when I think the ordeal is nearly over, 
Maggie invests further minutes accessing the check register, 
Methodically entering the necessary data...
Before tearing out the check… ONE PERFORATION AT A TIME!

Ol’ Fred gets fed three times a day at the “home”, 
But he still gets out. 
The old ladies in their wheelchairs in the hallway are not bad looking, 
But since they are catatonic Fred lacks interaction.

As he checks out he feels compelled to tell poor Lori, the cashier, 
About his latest trip to Vegas...
“My leg swelled up like a redwood log--oozing fluid like you couldn't believe. 
I soaked every towel in the hotel room.

Fred, morbidly obese,
Lifts up his pant leg to expose a freakish wreck of a leg,
Giant oozing red sores begging for amputation.
Lori gets queasy and runs off.

Alas, my can’t-miss convention. 
Find a buyer with only one or two items, cash in hand, 
Sparsely clad in gym shorts (no pockets–nowhere to dig for change), 
Cigarettes tucked into the waist (further indication of no pockets).

I hit this jackpot and revel in the glory of my brilliant selection. 
Miss gym-shorts pays, gone in a flash, lighting up as she strides through the double doors, Leaving me with my tuna and mustard, cash in outstretched hand,
Broad smile of evil satisfaction.

Then, my lovely cashier informs me that it “will be just a minute”. 
It’s time for her break.
Another cashier arrives with a new cash drawer. 
Time goes by as the personnel exchange is made in tight quarters.

The replacement cashier triple counts the new drawer for verification, 
Carefully enters a nine hundred and fifty-three digit employee code,
Then finally faces me, acknowledging my existence
For the first time.

We’re ready. 
He scans the tuna. 
It doesn’t register.
EGAD, A PRICE-CHECK!

Life mirrors life. The world is coming to a swift and unholy end.

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