My Sister the Stripper

My sister the stripper, the belle of the ball.

Push-up-bra-tip-cup she’s gone by last call.

Exceeds at excess with a rip in her dress.

Succeeds at success she’s a true triple threat.

Spent rent on expenses; tuition's past due.

She fights the gag reflex doing duos for you.

On the Edge like Heath Ledger - a bender from hell.

Ditched her lab partner and just made the bell.

Edits for predators a night on the town.

Jaeger-bomb-booty-bumps the singles rain down.

Prince Charming’s alarming he steps on her toes.

She stutter-step stumbles and powders her nose.

Mid-terms with tapeworms the dog ate her books.

Professor undressed her with one creepy look.

Laugh lines from wincing but she’s not convinced.

Her grade point average has slid ever since.

My sister the stripper she’s doing her best

But it’s time for a break, she needs some rest.

*********

(Note: this is a fictional character!)

Over at D'verse Poets Pub Victoria is having us dig into our archives and edit an old poem. On my computer files I have my poems organized based on a number of categories but I have one folder I call "Doggerel". This is the folder of forgotten poems that I have decided are just bad poetry. This one I fear may still fit that bill but I have reworked it a number of times and I had a lot of fun with it.  There is a whimsical note to it however, the subject is very real - this is from a very dark time in my life and my own experience with addiction. 

What Happens in Vegas...

Thrust to calypso
drumbeat bite
bottom lip
bang a gong.

It's on like Donkey Kong.

Edgy premise on the
edge of the precipice
climbing across a
broken moon.

Boom boom boom.

Cryptic crickets
rapidly climbing
fancy pants make-believe
Master of disguise.

Blood shot eyes.

Leveraged beverage
pepper on a cheese souffle
busted with a bad toupee
Turtle wax carjack

Cracka' had a heart attack.

******

Toads are Getting Listed Today

Fib

A
fib.
A lie.
Spiraling
into the eye of
a hurricane - breaking the curl
of a wave that I'm ripping right into the chain
of my own D.N.A. like the
curve of the milky
way back to
the be
gin
ing.
It's fib.
Fall into
the golden rectangle
can never escape it - it chases
me into the gates of insanity. As I am
spiraling out of control. I
try to regain my
composure
I count
to
one

*******

Toads are using the Fibonacci Sequence for poetry - and it's cool.

She's So Cc-c-c-c-c-cold

A 

cold 

wind blows

she knows

she throws 

her weight around

and I knew to 

run for the hills

before the hammer 

came 

down.

My Papa warned me

about women scorned

and to pull up my pants 

when the party is over.

But took I a chance 

on December romance

and that was the year that

Hell really froze over.

Today is Day 2 of a 5 Day free promotion for my Kindle Chapbook "Rough Around the Edges". 

Details are here on my Author Blog "Notes from the Edge" - support you local poet!

anyone lived in a pretty how town

Fireblosson from Imaginary Garden has us writing a poem in a poem in a poem. One of my early favorites was ee cummings and the way he abused my beloved language. I hope this will be seen as a thoughtful tribute to cummings not a shameless rip off.

*****
I met anyone in a pretty how town
poetry up by grade point down
he scratched my think and listened my hear
round by circle to glasses by ear

(north south east west)

drip by drop by teacher by taught
anyone wasn't but he always is
that by that and this by this
over to under by no to not

(sun rain snow wind)

he smiled my happy and yelled my mad
he teetered my has and tottered my had
better by smaller and more by less
quicker to snail by checkers to chess

(coke pepsi 7up sprite)

downside left and upside right
smell by cheek by close by nose
poem by pencil by pen by prose
rose by smell by poem by sight

(morning noon evening night)

poem by door by open anyone
words by letters by does by done

Forty (40)

I woke up today and it was

twenty years from yesterday.

I knew it was twenty years

Because the music gave me a headache.

I slapped a kid for teaching me

to battle rap - he rapped about

pimpin’ out my wife and sister.

When I pinned his tongue ring to his chin,

He cried and ran away.

My court date is next week.

There is really no upside to 40.

But I’m still very immature

so maybe there’s still hope.

I Googled “Cure for 40”

The top answer was “50”

Fucking Google.

After a little more research I found out

“40 is the new 30.”

That didn’t sound so bad

Until I asked a 30-year-old what he thought…

“Cha right” he said “Dude yer old.”

Then he skateboarded over my foot.

Fucking Kids

*******

This is another poem for my Chapbook exclusive to d'Verse.

Middle Aged White Poet

I finally figured out how to format my chapbook "Rough Around the Edges" for Kindle and it is available on my Amazon Author Page here. It is only available in Kindle format at this time. If you do not own a Kindle there is a free Kindle Reading App for Mac, PC, Smartphones and Tablets available for download here. I intend to publish print copies in the future if there is a positive response on Kindle. 

I am posting the poem "Middle-aged White Poet" from the chapbook as a bit of shameless self-promotion. This poem was originally conceived for the Velvet Verbosity 100 Word Challenge earlier this year, however, it has since been reworked and edited beyond recognition. If you follow my blog you will see that about half of the 28 poems premiered on my Blog in some draft or partial form. The other half are original to this publication. The poems are presented sequentially to represent some of my life's experiences. 

This is my first stab at publication and I am basically winging it. If you do decide to pick up a copy please leave a constructive review on Amazon or a comment on this thread. I am interested in how to become a better Poet & Author so all comments are appreciated (including critical ones)

*******

Middle-aged white guy writing poetry

It’s not pretty

But I really love it - I always have.

A word nerd since my early teens

John Lennon Imagining,

Bob-Dylan-Thomas, Lizard King

Blew my mind with poetry

And it’s never been the same for me.

Let it be Lord, let it be.

And right away I could see

these dudes were inside my head.

They said the things I’d I wished I’d said.

They understood and spoke to me

with innocent experience

iconoclasts in past and present tense.

Feelings so intense they circumvent

my conflicted disobedience.

Feelings from so deep inside 

that sometimes even I don’t realize

the blood stains on the page are mine.

So why not me, Lord, why not me?

Because I was born without a pedigree -

A white suburban refugee where

we never mention child-abuse,

and we always get the right to choose,

and never ever get refused service for not wearing shoes.

So I turned my cap back to hide my bald spot.

My angst is in my pudding cup.

But don’t tell me I didn’t earn my seat

and I don’t have the right to speak

and be heard if I wannabe.

Word.

I’m just an aging word-nerd who knows what

it’s like to hurt and not be heard.

But proud enough to stake a spot out in the crowd

and use my voice to shout it out

and tell my story loud enough

that anyone who gives a shit can sit and listen to another …

Middle-aged white poet

Failure to Communicate

Some men you just can't reach. 

You just don't listen boy.

You leave me no choice.

So you're gunna get what we got. 

                                                          

"What we got here is failure to communicate."

Those wild blues eyes 

disguise what's not there.
No surprise you're dying 
those lies are tearing you up inside

"Sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand."

Real Toad are putting our favourite movie lines to work in a poem unrelated to the line or character. So hard to choose but in the end I had to go with my man Paul.

Domestic Bliss

I’ve been tricked into domestic bliss.

Behavior alteration with

Soy lattes and strawberry whips

Pavlov’s dog could not resist.

An upward mobile Stepford man.

who salivates at Starbucks cups.

Florescent yellow pee flows freely

in the sweet spot where the beautiful

people glow and flutter with utter disdain.  

And God forbid I give the kid

a damn hamburger

or raise my hand in anger.

So I smile and wave and walk the line

no matter what it is I crave. 

I trade my whiskey laugh for a golf clap.

Attend south-beach-high-fiber-low-fat-candle-parties.

I volunteered for social circumcision

in the missionary position; where only

momentary indecision and the

cesarean incision stand between

me and my vasectomy…

Have you met the new-improved

extremely made-over version of

who I really ought to be?

Five pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight

Beaten into a state of reasonable complicity. 

But this is the time of my life.

Just ask my wife.

And on third blue moon when the stars line up

We steal a moment to ourselves 

and put the rules up on the shelf.

And for those few stolen moments

we allow ourselves to be overcome by ecstasy.

And nothing so sublime as this ever could exist

without the painful sacrifices  of Domestic Bliss.

*******

This is one of my poems from my chapbook I just finished editing today. I pulled it out of the closet for the the D'verse second birthday. I am just fumbling around trying to navigate my first upload on to Kindle Amazon. Anyways happy birthday guys!

Bang Bang Bang Crash

Today at D'verse Poetics we are dipping into a summer with Claudia:

"Fata morgana – chimera – mirage – summer heat illusions – you name it, a blend between reality and a short drift into that blurred space that dizzies our brain a bit on days when scorching heat hits heavy from a cloud-less sky–"

I only missed our return to Anglo-Saxon roots form with "Bang, bang, bang, crash" alliteration (more here). I tried to combine the two. I took at trip back to my summers growing up  in northern British Columbia where we did a lot of  Banging and Crashing!!

*******
Moonshine by moonlight well after midnight we howl
like madmen and make the ground shake.

Crashing our cars and careening off fenceposts
loosing our lunch for the love of the chase.

Wild whiskey weekends at remote country lakes
with stock cars and shotguns and sexy ex-girlfreinds.

We're kids from the country, we have cow-tipping fun.
Rednecks run rampant  - we always say Ma'am.

Sunshine soaked summers with tears in our ears
and we Bang and we Bang and we Bang and we Crash!!!!!

*******