Signor Bialetti Brews the Coffee now


Grazie, grazie, Signor Bialetti
Natty with your moustache and pork-pie hat
Charming man, your aluminum design
And Italian elegance grace my stove

If Don Camillo were to visit now
And bring along his ****** pal Peppone
They would still argue faith and politics
Just as they do in Emelia-Romagna

But here, over biscotti and expresso -
Grazie, grazie, Signor Bialetti!

Elegy for a Four-Cup Coffee Maker

Poor Mister Coffee – may God grant you rest
After long years of humble service to man
You never abandoned your duty station
Next to the cookies and the kitchen sink

You were the first to bless each day at dawn
Your little red sanctuary lamp aglow
As with electricity you commingled
Water and coffee into a sacrament

Fruit of the bean and work of human hands -
But now you are silent, to drip no more

PowerPointLessNess

inspired by ConnectHook in Hello Poetry

Where is the screen is there an outlet here
Can anyone find a bulb for this machine
DATA FAIL RETRY oh this is
The wrong set wait a minute okay why

Don’t you all take a break while we sort this
Out I think that memory is in the car
Would you go check RESTART okay could
Someone find me RETRY okay listen

Everyone the computer doesn’t seem
To want to work today ha ha so um…

A Small Boy to His Pencil

O, Ticonderoga, my magic wand –
I wave you, and I am an engineer
Speeding a silver passenger train
From Texas to California, and back

I wave you once again; I am Robin Hood
Drawing my bow against a bishop fat:
“I invite you, Your Grace, to a great feast
in Sherwood Forest, at your own expense!”

I wave you yet again - and Old Miz Grouch
Fusses at me: “Do your sums! And don’t slouch!”

An Open Letter to…

A response to the recent fashion, victim-y and self-obsessed, of open letters

Dear Mean People,

You don’t know me but I know you hate me
Because you are not me so I hate you
Even though I don’t know you, but you hate me
For not being as kind and loving as me

So I forgive you, you Facs…Fascs…Fascists
For not thinking and feeling just like me
You just don’t understand my special needs
How my soul is a flower that always bleeds

Because your jack-boots stomped all over my heart
And I’ve got a degree; I’m really smart

Couplet for a Military Dentist

The call of the bugles, the thunder of drums -
Mount up! And ride to the sound of the gums!

Children Waiting for the School Bus

Children still wait for the yellow school bus
Along old country roads as early spring
Makes green the happy springtime of their lives
They carry backpacks now, and wear shoes every day

Because

The State of Texas sternly forbids bare feet
In the sacred halls of learning, even in the heat
Children ignore the passing cars, and joy
In their new world of giggles and first crushes

Cedar-wood pencils and Evangeline –
We too still wait for that yellow school bus