When I was just a little kid
I never liked a ****.
When I grew up it didn’t change
When I went to work.
I didn’t much like pranks and such
And  most practical jokes,
Whoopie cushions, pulled out chairs
And winking, leering blokes.

It was much more annoying to me
When the liars got to win.
It made me want to call them names
And kick them in the shin.
How anyone ever thought well of them
Made no sense to me.
They should have been taken to task
And called the enemy.

Schoolyard antics
Made me frantic
When they harassed the weak
The underweight, those in glasses
Those whose noses were tweaked.
Why didn’t their parents teach
These creeps to be more kind?
Or keep them home full time,
I’m sure nobody would mind.

Now I hate to watch the news
And see how many got elected.
If the average voter doesn’t know
At least they should have suspected
When billions of dollars disappear
And nobody is ever put in prison.
That means there are jerks out there
And that doesn’t take a lot of wisdom.

I sometimes wish Kafka was right
And the evil woke up differently.
Maybe they could be one foot tall
And not quite reach my knee.
Then we could see the crooks arrive
And lock them out of our conventions.
We’d just have to lglance to know
That they have dishonest intentions.

Schoolyard antics
Made me frantic
When they harassed the weak
The underweight, those in glasses
Those whose noses were tweaked.
Why didn’t their parents teach
These creeps to be more kind?
Or keep them home full time,
I’m sure nobody would mind.

my depression has become so apparent that it goes unnoticed
that thought terrifies me

ive become so good at acting like i understand how my mind works
maybe so good that it believes me
ive gotten so bad with words
that i cant recognize my own writing

its getting harder and harder to scribble out just one letter
its been months
im not doing any better

I miss those wonder-filled days
When watching clouds was fun,
As well as watching movies
And more than only just one.
Two movies, a serial and a cartoon
Was the Saturday morning fare
With greasy popcorn and sodas
If we could find fifty scents somewhere.

My brothers and I loved picking
Through those illegal dump sites
That lawless neighbors often used,
Near us, in the middle of the night.
Once I found a Buddha statuette
And didn’t know who the guy was.
In Christian America of the fifties
Knowing such things had no cause.

Brother Jim found a tricycle there
Almost completely okay to ride
And Dan found a kind of wood box
With a handful of coins inside.
He got to pay for the movies for us
But Sam didn’t find much at all.
He did manage to slip at the time
And take a pretty hilarious fall.

Maybe it was easier then, those days
For kids to stay so entertained.
The only thing that might spoil our fun
Was if nature chose to make it rain.
Many times our fun was exploring
And rain could make it a weary slog.
It caused some unpleasant journeys
Through some unattractive bogs.

We built go-carts out of some junk
We gathered on our treasure hunts,
But usually they were contraptions
My mother definitely did not want.
Mom was like that, careful with us.
Worry-wart that she was back then
It didn’t stop or really slow down
Us four adventure-minded children.

Leonard left
****** words
Unheard
Steadily
Swimming
Upstream
Against the current
Of my mind
Determined
To spawn
For the first time

T. Ronald Dump
Thought he had a jump
On all this messy "prezzy" biz
Which took us to the precipice
Of our national destruction
With one skewed election.
A **** with bad elocution
Is in charge with no solutions.

A fool got elected
Now we are all unprotected
From taking a journey
Turning this into **** Germany
Because he knows well
That in a short spate of hell
He will make tons of money
And he finds that so funny.

Meanwhile we are dying
And without any trying
He will take a great thing
And leave it gasping
For that last healthy breath
While he watches the death
And with one of his ugly sighs
Blames it on the other guys.

Those of us who are old
Needed heeding when told
That this was very ugly old news.
We saw it happen to the Jews
The intellectuals and gays
In the not so distant days
Of scary World War Two
And now it will happen to you.

T. Ronald Dump
Thought he had a jump
On all this messy "prezzy" biz
Which took us to the precipice
Of our national destruction
With one skewed election.
A **** with bad elocution
Is in charge with no solutions.

I can’t watch the news anymore
That ugly orange man is a bore
And a pompous *** and a ****.
Him in charge? That’ll never work.
We are in such trouble, so deep
It’s a wonder any of us can sleep.
I find myself in a constant depression.
It’s like Americans didn’t learn the lesson
In the last of several pointless wars.
We were all taught now and before
When we sent our young off to die
And we weren’t even really sure why.

We brought many of them back in bags
Left the living in dumps and rags
Because we stopped acting like better men
In taking care of our sacrificed veterans.
And did we invest the money wisely instead?
No we chose to obscenely feather the beds
Of people who were never under threat
And we haven’t wised up. No, not yet.
We keep on throwing good toward evil.
Like feeding cotton fields to boll weevils
We elect criminals without recompense.
So little leadership today makes sense.

The land we live in today is so strange.
Right and wrong have been rearranged.
We are lied to and we cheer them on
Until almost all our rights are gone,
Make heroes out of thieves and crooks
Mostly based on fame and their looks.
Half of us don’t even know the issues.
The rest of us reach for the tissues.
Our only solid hope was for us to vote
The sad thing is we’re in the same boat
And no matter what the right is thinking
Our sick national boat is quickly sinking.

You may drink
To obscure your pain
Play videos games
Chat on Facebook
Immerse yourself
In other social media
Watch movies, TV
And YouTube videos
Chasing novelty

Going after
That consumer high
From the merchandise
You buy

But in time
The silence will find you
And the anguish you were blind to
Will consume you to

Till, the pharmaceutical companies own you
Because you have to
Take so many anti-depressants
Just to get through
One more day

Rooster has to crow in the morning
Cat has to prowl around at night.
I see a petty dictator ruining lives
I grab my pencil ready to fight.
We’re not in the dark ages anymore.
Nor are we still in the Old West.
We don’t slap on a pistol and go out
And put a bunch of lead into the pest.

So, I write down the words that I feel.
I call a snake-oil salesman what he is.
I carefully explain what a crook looks like
And show off the difference from a Wiz.
They may claim they’re an eagle today
If that is the delusion they are in.
But I will be quick to dispel such a lie
By pointing out the wattles on their chin.

Pigeons spread their droppings all over.
Dog likes to dig around in the dirt.
I have to point out the creeps in the world
Then take appropriate joy when they’re hurt.
My hope is the people that are fooled will see
They don’t have to sit and eat the lies.
They can stand up and ***** in the face
Of those who are criminals in disguise.

Tell any scoundrels exactly what they are
And let them know you are not fooled.
Don’t let them walk away feeling proud.
Make sure they’re appropriately schooled.
Knock any martinet off their pedestal.
Tell them you think they are a clown.
Don’t leave their ego in undented shape.
Then go on and kick them when they’re down.