My Daughter has a fitbit that records her every move.
She wears it daily on her wrist in her efforts to improve.
Her every step, lap and jump thus are duly noted.
To self-improvement and fitness, she surely is devoted.

Me? I can get tired watching football on T.V.
The treadmill in my basement is piled high with clean laundry.
I can’t resist a chocolate bar, my diet isn’t great.
Does rising from my easy chair still count as lifting weights?

Still, there should be a wearable for the chubby hubby set.
To monitor the quality of the sitting time we get.
To count each doughnut we consume, to list each chocolate bar.
To note the steps avoided when we choose to take the car.

Of Time and Love-
Those gifts you gave-
Only memories may I save.
Although I have a goodly store
Don’t call me greedy for wanting more.


Those other gifts you made for me-
A home and loving family-
I hold them close about me now
that my love has outlived our vow.


With you, dear love, I saw the world
Not half bad for a Bronx bred girl
Yet I would yield the world and more
If Time, that thief, gave us encore. .

It’s strange, there was no pain.
The atom moves too fast for that.
It left my shadow on that wall,
There’s nothing else intact.

It’s strange to die so quickly
I had no time for fear.
Swept up, as in a rapture
Less than a leaf , more than a tear.

My conscious self dissolving
Like a sugar dropped in tea.
No body left to bury
You incinerated me.

Elsewhere in the city
They’ll unearth a murdered clock-
It’s hands forever frozen
on the moment I was not.

**** works all day at his factory job making I Pods for you and me.
The pay is low and his hours are long, but there’s job security.
The company boss is a suspicious sort of his minions on the job.
They must be searched before they leave for fear he might be robbed.
There is a safety net at work for **** and all his crew.
It’s not medical and dental like exists for me and you.
No, this net is a cargo net- to catch leapers, naturally.
for preventing suicides is key to profitability.

My parents passed away last spring. Two weeks apart, it was hard to bear.
She was a cellist, he played violin. Their instruments were old and rare.
Growing up, I’d hear them practice. For practice is the only way
to make effort appear effortless in the first chairs on concert day.
Our house resounded with their music. As I grew, I’d also play.
Our family spoke with strings, not voices.
Then there was silence, when they passed away.

Her Cello was made by Testore; His violin was by Lupot,
both treasures of the Luthier’s art.
I wept to see them gathering dust.
Mute witnesses as Death played his part.

It’s hard for artists nowadays to afford such quality.
hard, as well, for me to sell, to send their instruments away
A friend suggested a better way; to keep my loved ones’ legacy
My colleagues play with them on loan; their borrowed voices speak to me.

I am patient in my work. I take pride in what I do.
I have no room to make mistakes that would, forever, be on view.
I crouch before the stone with the dew still on the grass.
I record the names and dates which are their only epitaphs.
I’ve been at this work some time and I always work alone.
For lives written on water I record their term in stone.
Each gravestone holds a story of a life, once lived, now past.
These lives of joy and sorrow which, though precious, do not last.
Each one searching for their meaning, experienced alone,
from the moment of conception until the day that they’re called home.
Some here had lived a century, others just a day,
their entrances and exits incused for posterity.
Fate, which is inexorable, brings everyone this way.
to leave a stone upon a stone, to ponder and to pray

One more big score in a life time of crime,

One more  big heist and he'd retire this time.

His friends were in prison, the others were dead.

Jessie James was in hiding with a price on his head.

Once more in the saddle, take the reins Jessie James

You fought for the South, and your anger remains.

This Earth taught you violence and the lessons  well learned.

The Yankees taught arson when your family farm burned.

He's a cold blooded killer, this preacher's young son,

with no hope of Heaven with the deeds that he's done.

He's a hero to some and a villain to others

This man who robbed trains with  those two Younger brothers

There's a price on your head and Bob Ford's taking aim

as you climb up to straighten your wife's picture frame...

Once more in the saddle take the reins, Jesse James

Despite the wind and driving rain,
At their posts they must remain.
In woolen garb and white glove dress,
Twenty one steps, no more no less.
They honor those who came before
Who, unnamed, fell in foreign wars
Entombed forever far from home
in their sarcophagus of stone.
For duty and honor they remain
Despite the wind, despite the rain.

The other side of Lonely
is where words best not be spoken.
An amazing space where two can live
when both their hearts are broken.
Where money serves to be a salve
to fill the empty places.
Where Joy and Hope no longer live-
You can see it in their faces.

I can recall her I first loved when we were in our teens.
We planned to marry way too young; such was our childish dream.
In truth she was too beautiful for one of common clay
With a body like a Goddess, but I fumbled it away.

I recall another summer’s Love, so different in her way.
She was an intellectual who also loved to play.
We picnicked out at planting fields, I still recall our time
I still remember thinking she’s the best I’d ever find.

A dark eyed beauty first I loved, then a strawberry red.
I remember feeling awestruck when she came with me to bed.
Yes, she had another love and kept me on a sting.
Perhaps I tarried there too long but I don’t regret a thing.

Winter melted into spring and brought my next romance;
a lovely little brunette ; you taught me how to dance.
We shared drinks before the fire in a snug little pub I knew.
I’ll admit it wasn’t difficult to fall in love with you

Our relationship was, tempestuous. Perhaps that’s being kind.
Yet, whenever I think of you, I find some cause to smile.
You were different from the others, all the others I have known.
I remember how we treasured stolen moments spent alone

I choose not to apologize for leaving you so sad.
I regret I never said that you’re the best I ever had.

I was surely no Lothario; I was decent in the main.
I remember all who loved me and we did not love in vain.
I recall each name and face and the memories make me glad
But my wife and mother of my child is the best I’ve ever had.

It’s a beast on the Potomac
That should inspire fear.
It respects nobody’s privacy.
That much has been made clear.
It’s appetite- voracious.
It’s goal- total control.
It feasts upon the people.
It’s coming for your guns and gold.
Concern for its’ own power
is its all-consuming goal.
It cares nothing for the little guy
Forget the lies you’re told.
What is the food that feeds the beast?
Why is it growing still?
It loves other people’s money
And it always gets its fill.

Barrack’s on vacation, playing golf by the sea,
but life keeps interrupting and wasting greens fees
Iraq is in flames and the country may fall,
Barrack steps calmly up and addresses his ball.
While ISIS is murdering Kurds by the bunch
Barrack’s on vacation and ordering lunch.
Israel is in trouble as Hamas wages war.
Barrack limits arms shipments and tallies his score.
Ferguson, Missouri suffers racial unrest,
while Barrack is debating which driver is best.
James Foley is dead, his throat has been cut.
Our President speaks, and then he makes a nice putt.
My colleagues rebuke me. “Don’t beat a dead horse!”
The President’s great, he’s staying the course.

Debt be not proud, though lenders label thee
useful and powerful, for thou art not so.
For those poor souls who take your ready dough
Pay not Principal, just interest and the fees.
Unlike cash wealth and true liquidity
Which, in sum, denote prosperity,
Your burden would enthrall them where they go
And collection agents nightly tell them so.
Your rates are slave to a data dependent Fed,
and you are a poison consigning men to Hell.
Cash wages are what we need to slumber well,
Free of this debt incurred with the stroke of a pen.
One more loan payment and we 'll eschew your fee.
Then Debt shall be no more. We’ll be debt Free.

“There will be no second Newtown here!”
Our principal decreed.
“Forget armed guards on campus,
Cans of soup are all we need.”
“When murderous villains roam our halls
And the shots are growing louder,
We’ll take them down with well-placed throws
of canned New England Chowder!”
“With a giant rubber slingshot,
we will make the villain pay.
Why, with adequate supplies of soup
We could hold out for days!”


This policy of “Soup to ****”
Is not like concealed carry.
It seems like an idea straight out
of Curly, Moe and Larry.

Apparently Shakespeare got it all wrong
when he threatened the lawyers in verse.
The carnage in Paris proves he should have written:
"Let's **** all the cartoonists first!"

It was back in the winter of Ninety –nine,
the day before Paddy’s on Chicago’s south side,
when a routine traffic stop turned deadly for one;
James Camp was shot in the face with his own gun.
Kevin Dean was the killer, his victim wore blue.
Dean did what he’d previously threatened he’d do.
He was out on probation for attempting such a deed.
On this day he struck and he made a “pig” bleed.
It’s a very fine line we police have to toe;
Act too fast- you’re a bully- Be a corpse if too slow.
There was a fierce struggle and one shot was fired;
Fold a flag for the widow whose Love has expired.
Kevin Dean is in custody, charged with the crime.
This time there’s no bail and he’ll surely do time.
In a Cop bar we sat, nursing grievances and beers.
We’re alone on the streets and we have been for years.
The smell of turned earth and a young widow’s tears,
were fresh in our memory as the next roll call neared.

For Secret servicing so nice
and pay for play that rocked your world,
best keep private your secret vice;
If there's a next time, Pay the Girl.

Squabbling with a *******
in Cartegena of all places
has made you unemployable
and caused flushed and embarrassed faces.

Your actions placed POTUS at risk-
Foreign relations are so tricky
Settle on price before you play,
avoiding situations sticky.

Your servicing was less than secret
The whole world knows you sought some "strange"
A shame you lasted just a minute-
still no excuse to ask for change.

Think of it as a thirst for Truth
That can’t be quenched by dry Vermouth.
Those souls  who in the bottle find
a sauce of solace for troubled minds.

Because I can conceive of wine,
Somewhere there grows a fruitful vine.
Existence made certain by concept possible-
an essential premise Ontological.

From the grapes sweet nectar flows
To please the palate and charm the nose.
Its mysteries bring blurred speech and vision
At bottle’s bottom they find religion...

Some seek their Truth on distant peaks
From Fakirs dressed in linen sheets.
Some in bare ruined choirs dwell
With thoughts of Heaven spiced with Hell.  

Still others have declared wine evil
An attitude I find Medieval
Their wine grapes meet a sadder fate
reduced to raisins on a plate.

From Vine to press, from field to glass
A boon companion to Life’s repast.
Red or White, no cause for Schism
A sommelier hears your catechism.

It had been some years
since you and I
had shared any stage and time
but here we are
in another's garden.
Strands of silver now showcase
your still pensive lovely face
You played Rosalind with me
in William's Arden.
Our theater borne romance
never really had much chance.
I know I hurt you
and I seek your pardon.
Never again to know that touch
which we both enjoyed so much-
It's true with time and age
positions harden.
Still, you tempted, and I ate,
and with that we sealed our fate.
That was long ago and
in another Garden.

They finally did it,
so often they'd tried.
The whole Human race,
dead, a suicide.

The people I'd chosen
made war on Iran,
Until the last drop of Isaac
bled out on the sand.

Their allies engaged
and the dread missiles flew.
Nuclear winter
took care of a few.

The rivers of Babylon
clotted with dead.
So it was written.
So it was said.

The tribes of the Prophet
and Abraham's clan
took everyone with them
so I understand.

I really will miss them.
If I had eyes, I cry.
They only knew How,
They stopped asking "Why".

Their Cities are silent,
filled with cockroaches only,
They consigned me to Myth
and now I am lonely.

My brother related a strange dream that he had:
It took place in a bar; he was there with our Dad.
they both ordered a Guinness, in the mood for a stout.
They both were committed  to enjoy their night out
The barkeep then asked if they'd be running a tab.
Jim reached in his pocket, he paid for his drink  and Dad's.
" I don't think we will."" Just the one now" He said,
"For I'm on blood thinners and my Dad here is dead."

Two objects lying in a field; a plowshare and a sword.
“Which of these gifts will they select?” pondered Mazda the Lord.
Two brothers, sons of Adam both, were passing by that way.
They spied the glittering artifacts that waited in the clay.
Hevel saw the plowshare would be great for planting seed in sod.
Qayin, the sword blade in his hand, looked at his brother odd.
Hevel was a Sheppard who minded Rams and Ewes.
Qayin grew crops and farmed the land, the only life he knew.
For Hevel to possess that gift did not sit well with Qayin
In a jealous rage he used the sword and thus Hevel was slain.
Qayin could not face his mother’s eyes, with shame he bore his sin.
Of his free will he’d swung the blade that did his brother in.
Qayin buried Hevel in that field to keep wild dogs away.
Then with both glittering gifts in hand, Qayin wandered far away.
In time Man would perfect the objects first found in that field.
The weapon would proliferate, evolve from Bronze to steel.
The tears of Mother Eve still flow throughout recorded time
because we are the sons of Qayin and profit from his crime.

Like a Siren calling me
Relentlessly to death,
The Liquor in my cabinet
haunted my every breath.

It started out quite innocent-
A dram sipped here and there-
Progressing ounce by ounce into
a sordid love affair.

A beer or three drunk at the game-
I was jolly company.
But drinking in the parking lot
made me disorderly.

Cold winter evenings lost their gloom
once my pints had been consumed.
I lost my wife and family
And live in rented rooms.

I had to get myself some help
To rise from my despair-
I sat in meetings at my Church
On a folding metal chair.

I have a mentor guiding me
He’s been to Hell and back.
He always takes my phone calls
when Johnnie Walker wants me back..

And so I will not drink tonight
Two weeks now I’ve been sober.
I spilled the drink into the sink-
I think, I hope, it’s over.

As the Rose is the flower of flowers,
Exalted above all the rest,
Their color denoting desire
Which words alone cannot express.
Some shades are symbols of friendship.
Some others connote happiness.
Some buds are a byword for passion,
and the reddest of blooms says it best.
A first love is never forgotten-
unless you forget yourself first.
It lingers in mind like the taste of your lips.
It is either a blessing or curse.
We were little more than adolescents
That day we embraced by the shore.
Though the tides haven’t changed
It has been many years
And now I will see you no more.
My tears are my heart’s lamentations
For a Love that was too long repressed.
I place my red rose on your casket.
The reddest of blooms says it best.

A winter storm had dumped a foot
of wet and heavy slushy snow.
As the sidewalk does not clean itself
I dressed to face my winter foe.

I worked too hard, I worked too fast
as I shoveled out our walks and paths.
My heart was racing; I' was feeling done,
then a golden retriever came on the run.

"hey there good boy." I greeted the pup.
"A Saint Bernard would have been nice too!"
He sniffed then licked my ungloved hand.
"Somebody must be looking for you."

Just then I heard from down the block
a voice called "Rascal" and the dog's head turned.
It clearly was his master's voice
"He's over here" I replied in turn.

His owner was a kindly older man
glad to retrieve his pet unharmed.
He'd gotten out to play in the snow
someone had left the gate not closed.

Rascal offered me his paw
and looked at me with deep brown eyes
We shook, then he accepted his leash
Rascal and his master  then headed home.

I never saw Rascal again
or meet his master on the street.
We met just that once on a snowy eve.
The memory is  all that I got to keep.

I'd often heard my mother say
that we oft meet angels in disguise
I can't say for certain this was such a case.
I have no proof for the worldly wise.

They stood together for a photograph; Aunt Bessie and Irene.
One the aging matriarch, the other still a teen.
Irene’s hair was a fiery red well matched with eyes of blue.
Bessie’s days are numbered now, life’s journey nearly through..
Bessie’s one hand held her cane, the other Irene’s arm.
Irene was a vision, heading off to senior prom.
One has all her life before her, for the other just a past.
Irene looks much as Bessie did,  when Bessie was a lass.
I have seen old photographs, creased and Sepia toned
When Bessie was  Belle of the ball and stood beside some crone.

They're your uncles or your brothers;
They're the ones who fought and bled.
Theirs are the names upon this wall,
the legion of our dead.
They didn't run to Canada
when they heard their country call.
They ran toward the sound of guns;
All through the Sixties did they fall.
So spare a moment at the wall,
Peruse their names incused.
Long Summers past, they were like us,
with so much more to lose.

It might have been beautiful, and certainly smart
Born with your academics and my poet’s heart.
It might have been witty, pithy and wise;
possessing your nose and my two emerald eyes.

It might have been evil; it may have proved kind;
the first of our brood was the last of our line.
Not that we ever will know, I suppose.
Just idle questions  geneticists might pose

It would have been born with ten fingers and toes
If left, unimpeded, for nine months to grow.
We were both too young, both too unprepared,
This life, unintended, was not to be spared.

Forty winters have passed since that fateful decision.
It was swept from our path with a clinic’s precision.
Now you, too, are gone, and that leaves only me
To mourn for our child not permitted to be.

There is a spot
atop a hill
beneath an old shade tree.
It is the place my parents rest
and thus is dear to me.

It is a pleasant spot they chose,
now blanketed in snow.
I place my wreath and give a thought
to a Christmas long ago.

That Christmas Eve my father brought
a tree that filled the room.
My brother worked to fix the lights.
The girls sang Christmas tunes.

Atop the tree an ornament
A star that shone like gold.
Reminder of the miracle
of Christmas long ago.

The house is gone
and they have gone
The youngest has grown old.
Still I recall my sisters song
and that star that shone like gold.

Lillian Caine was the young lady’s name.
She was a romantic at heart.
She was painfully thin with a wart on her chin,
and stood tall at the end of the line.
Little Jim Coke was a short little bloke,
A cherub like smile his chief charm
He soon won her heart, they were seldom apart,
They looked like a “10” arm in arm.
Lillian thought they were destined to wed;
Her dear little Jim thought the same.
When they wed they became,
by their hyphenated last name,
Mr. & Mrs. Coke-Caine

Science tells us that natural selection
plays no small role in our complexion.
Environment too must play its role
in making us white, brown or gold.
Southern whites, whose genes spend time
In hot and sunny southern climes,
may, in the course of generations,
start looking brown to Scandinavians.
While Blacks who live in the Northwest
see dark tones fade, go unexpressed.
In time all hatred based on race
perhaps will prove to  be misplaced.
If whites turn brown and blacks turn pale
for whom would Reverend Sharpton rail?
When mostly Mocha men and women
Drop clothes and prejudice and get to sinning
Our census forms will need fine tuning
when the only box for race is human.

In our small town of Hixton, Wisconsin,
The future looked decidedly grim.
Population was down to four hundred
And we all thought its best days had been.
We’re a small town North West of Milwaukee
where U.S Thirteen passes by.
Here the median age is past forty,
with less than one girl for each guy.
The town fathers were in a quandary;
scratching their heads and their chins.
Half the houses were vacant and boarded;
Just a trickle of tax coming in..
“Our churches are bare ruined choirs,
Our young finish school and they leave.
The town as we know it is dying,
There’s only one chance of reprieve!”
Some thought it an outlandish suggestion.
It offended all those who believe.
“The renaming of Hixton, Wisconsin
must be done with all possible speed.”
“Desperate times demand desperate measures;
This is the last card I have up my sleeve.”

It was done as our Mayor suggested
and, as hoped for, the new blood poured in.
Our post mark is much in demand now;
Since we began living in “Sin”

He’s number Fourteen in your program,
“Mr. Cub” to long suffering fans.
Ernie Banks was a soft spoken guy
who launched many ***** in the stands.
A true hero who led by example;
the face of the franchise, in fact.
He never did play in the Series
and there is some sadness in that.
Yet today is a great day for baseball
in the heavenly precincts above.
I’m sure, just like you,
That they’re bound to play two
Once Ernie has tossed down his glove

Whether Indian or Asian
Whether yellow black or white
The very thing that makes you “you”
is hidden out of sight.

Skin differences are but skin deep,
The roots of love and hate
Are in the wrinkled Universe
That lives inside each pate.

Everything you ever knew
And all you've ever loved
Are self-contained within your brain
That’s how it ever was.

Our Angels and our demons
Live inside our frontal lobes
Since time is short and fate is sure
I’d rather love than loathe.

( inspired by a comment made by Dr. Ben Carson, an American)

In the shadow of Ben Bulben
off the road from Mullaghmore
in the parish yard of Drumcliffe
you will find me there for sure.
It is a fair spot where I lie
Here in my native loam.
This was my heart’s desire
This was my mother’s family home.
How beautiful is Sligo
that I nevermore will see.
I’ve now become a part of that
which was a part of me.

Never underestimate the power of hate
in the mind of a man with a gun.
The signs were all there, and all were ignored,
Until his planned evil was done.

A proud gay black man took a gun in his hand,
and authored his own revelation.
His anger and rage writ in blood on the street
with shell casings as the punctuation.

Two young lives destroyed; another in pain.
They were somebody’s daughter and son.
The cowardly killer then swallowed the barrel
and it ended as it had begun

Gather the ones you love in your arms
For each day may well prove your last one.
For hate, like a hunter, is stalking the land;
Only Fools think this is done.

It’s too delicate to touch, but beautiful to behold.
An Illuminated prayer book, from Bruges, I’ve been told.
The unknown artist carbonized vellum taken from a sheep,
Into a thing of beauty that is not mine to keep.
The images are beautiful, a celebration of the Divine,
a testament of faith from another place and time.

There was a young lady from Cork
Who took up with a bloke from New York.
Their one night of pleasure she always will treasure
as now she's awaiting the stork.

A car crashed into our tree last night, one fatal last mistake.
It was a cooper mini; I never heard the driver brake.
My wife, a nurse, ran to the car, then, sadly, backed away.
“There’s nothing I can do for him. This was his dying day.”
I could see there was a lot of blood; the driver’s chest was crushed.
I got the precinct on my cell. I said-“you need not rush.”
An ambulance came and his corpse was freed;
at the scene  he was pronounced deceased.
I knew he’d had a violent end, but reasoned it was quick at least.
The road was dry and freshly paved and, as per the EMT,
There was no hint of alcohol when they pried him from the tree.

The patrol called for his next of kin, and, as the sun rose in the East,
a woman with her baby came, her face a mask of grief.
Her fiancé was thirty and that night he’d tended bar.
He’d been working lots of overtime to save for their new car.
A baby’s needs are many and often dollars are too few.
I didn’t know how she would cope and somehow make it through
Her face betrayed a fresh concern; I saw her check her phone.
“I had sent my fiancé a text- he was late coming home.”
I knew what time the crash occurred; it had awakened me,
But I was unspecific.” It happened around three.”
She showed me then the text she’d sent that may have caused his end
The time stamped on her text message read “2:31AM”

In Orlando, there’s an emptiness words struggle to convey
As survivors try to comprehend what happened yesterday.
When the music and the laughter stopped, then fear and screams began.
The children of the city died at the hands of a madman.
Sons and Daughters, brothers, sisters; fifty dead in the attack
There is sadness in the City as the rainbows fade to black.


How beautiful that night had been; the dance floor pulsed with life.
Here were youth and beauty on display; not bitterness or strife.
At the bar with cash in hand they drank craft brews on tap.
It was last call for one and all, the D.J. played a Rap
Then sadness in the city as the rainbows fade to black.

Some blame the gun, some blame a Faith, some bluster; others hide.
In Orlando a grey mood prevails where sons and daughters died.
By dawn the sirens stopped their song, but there is no turning back
There is sadness in our Country as the rainbows fade to black.

The time has passed, too quickly,
since the years they served in war.
Some grow bald, others grey,
They are rounder than before.
Today’s objective is the restaurant
to beat the midday rush
When Retired Old Marines Eat Out
They usually meet for lunch.
At times like this, they reminisce
of D.I.’s they have known.
Speak the unused names of friends
who never made it home.
They give their time to charities;
Like Christmas toys for tots,
and package gifts for young Marines
who serve now they cannot.
They serve as honor guard for those
Who’ve reached the final post.
The few, the proud, who keep us free,
Have given more than most.
Perhaps not lean,
but still quire keen,
Semper Fi,
the Corps.

In this garden of stone
I reflect on my own
Of the journey that grief has imposed:
Those first sad raw days
When I walked in a daze
At the loss of a parent I loved.

Grief’s first taste is bitter
And only slowly gets better;
An acquired perspective I think.
It must be endured
Or else it consumes
those who seek false refuge in drink.

To love and be loved
Always carries this cost:
The Reaper insists on division.
The survivor condemned
To weep bitter tears
For that is the price of admission.

We die each night,
to sleep succumb .
Perhaps to dream,
remembering none.
Yet as we wait for
sleep to come,
we believe
we'll see
the morning sun.
Ten thousand million
days saw dawn
before the day
when I was born.
Ten thousand million
nights might end
ere ever I see home again.
If Being sees
in me no worth
perhaps this is
the last of Earth.
But as the Son
for mercy, dies.
Perhaps this good thief
too may rise.

What if Eden and Gethsema!ne
were in the selfsame place?
Then, in the spot where Adam fell,
knelt Christ to take his place.
Perhaps the tree of knowledge stood
where Peter fell asleep!
He lacked that night the stamina
his holy watch to keep.
The Via Dolorosa starts
where Peter struck the slave.
Passion cancels passion out
when there are souls to save.

My son passed on in 95’; his cause of death was AIDS.
We hadn’t spoken for some years; we were then estranged.
I could not understand the love he had for other men.
Still, I admit my heart was broken that his life was at an end.

Decades passed and I grew grayer, ready for my final bow.
I wish I’d been a better Dad; knowing what I know now.
Then it came, the letter, one he’d written long ago.
A card he’s sent for Father’s day some thirty years ago.

It filled my heart with gladness to read of his love for me.
If he only knew I loved him too. We might have both been free.
Life cannot give him back to me, nor all my tears erase,
Still I pray this was a sign he’s in a better place.

Beneath "the Blue Room" of Picasso
lies a mystery long concealed;
It is the portrait of a man
which only infrared revealed.
Reusing canvas is a trait
that struggling artists understand.
Concealing one work with another
masking the efforts of weaker hands.

We too are canvas of a sort
drawn in the culture of our birth.
Then, painted over by other masters
of uncertain provenance and worth.
Beneath the layer of the cynic
lies the young child's trusting eyes.
The image we are shown, world weary,
concealing where true beauty lies.

A bitter cold night to close out the year;
come sit here near the fire by me.
I have here a fine brandy
that was aged eighteen years,
but that never another will see.

So hold out your glass and I’ll give you a splash
to warm you and loosen your tongue.
Then we’ll each tell tall tales
Of our reprobate youth
And the disreputable things we had done.

We’ll remember with tears those we’ve lost this past year
Those who loved us despite what we’d done.
The Father who sacrificed all for his boys;
the Mother who lived for her sons.

A bitter cold night to close out the year;
I’m warmed by the fire’s soft glow.
If I shed a tear at the close of the year,
I pray don’t let anyone know.

The  same folks who regulate soda size,
and cheer as our youth turn to ***,
Just passed a law in the Golden State
Let me know if you like it or not.

On the college Campus in Cali
before couples can couple you see
both parties must sign a consent form
as state bill 967 decrees.

No matter if she's your fiancee,
They don't care He's  your steady or not,
It's **** if you have no  consent form
There's no excuse if you forgot.

The people who championed Liberty
for the gays and the transgenderees
should stay out of straight people's bedrooms

but will they?- there's no guarantee.

The room was dark at midday when Yogi breathed his last.
His brain, now starved for oxygen, went searching through his past.
Did he recall the shores of France back when he was nineteen?
Or think upon those rings he’d won with those great 50’s teams?
Dying, his mind searched frantically, jumping from place to place
Here was Larsen’s perfect game where he jumped and they embraced.
There was that heated argument when Robinson stole home.
Then the pain and anger when Steinbrenner sent him home.
Yet as these memories dissolved within his dying mind,
He finally found the peace he sought; his Carmen, good and kind.
He took her hand and they embraced on the shore of a moonlit sea.
Yogi’s gone. Now the future isn’t what it used to be.

Svelte and Pettite, just five foot three,
My Geminoid does it all for me.
My made to order Robotic mistress
with her luscious made to order kisses.
What flesh and blood girl can compare
with her Barbie curves and her platinum hair?
Tired and sore at the end of the day?
She skillfully rubs my cares away.
When I am in an amorous vein.
My Geminoid is always game.
She’s merely average as a cook,
-a minor defect in my book.
My Geminoid treats me like a King
and never nags me for a ring.
Single since the court’s decree
I know love bears no guarantee.
With a Geminoid, no need to chance
The vagaries of true romance.
Yet I would still set my Barbie free
If my Zelda would come back to me.