The Man in the Moon will be leavin’ soon
Officially, he retired.
But Polaris and some other stars
Are saying he got fired
The Man in the Moon would never leave
Of his own volition.
Management, cutting back on costs,
Is phasing out his position.

His quarterly reviews have not been going very well,
They say he isn’t any good with change.
When he gives his full attention, he seems to do ok,
But lately he’s been acting kind of strange,
His bosses claim he sleeps all day.
And on cloudy nights, he stays away,
(It’d be age discrimination if they said he’s getting old)
So they say that he won’t listen and won’t do as he is told.
They say because he has seniority,
That he resents authority,
Won’t show his new boss how the job is done,
And in their final summary, out of ten, they gave him three,
Said that he doesn’t hold a candle to the sun.

But those of us who know his work
Know he would never, ever shirk
Responsibility, or jobs that must be done -
At night when he works overtime,
Countless souls look up to him, but
At night they’ll never, ever, see the sun.

If The Man in the Moon is told to leave
Our lives will be amiss,
So I took a poet’s initiative
To make management a list:

Reasons Not to Fire the Man in the Moon
Who will watch young lovers kiss?
Who will push and pull the tides?
Who will occupy the space
Where The Man in the Moon resides?
Who will tell the farmer when it’s time to plant his field?
Who will lead the eclipse when the sun needs lunar shield?
Who will be the subject of songs and nursery rhymes?
Who will notify the werewolf when it’s his changin’ time?
Who will calm the sailors after stormy nights at sea?
Who will make a silhouette of an owl in the tree?
Who will light the children’s path each All Hallows’ Eve?
Who would raise vampires from their coffins
Were The Man in the Moon to leave?

I ask these questions with a plea
Knowing that, if it were up to me
And I had the power to blunt the cutter’s knife,
We’d leave the Earth and Heavens as they’ve been for all these years,
And The Man in the Moon would have his job for life.
PwL  5/24/15w

Oh Filbert what you thinking?
You were always such a nut
I want to slap you in the face
Punch you in the gut
Take away your laughter
Replace it with a frown
You just shouldn’t be that happy
When there’s misery all around.
pwl 5/20/15

Where you going?
What d’ya see?
A hundred thousand polka dots
A comin’ after me
Polka dots and tater tots
And french fried onion skins
A priest in a confession booth
Forgivin’ all our sins
Two or three gorillas
And an elephant in the room
Someone tell the maitre’ d
He’d best be leavin’ soon
Cuz the waiter and the waitress
Have figured out the plot
And if he hangs around much longer
He’s liable to be shot
By a psychopathic mushroom
Or a ******* pizza pie
While the rabid rocket scientist
Wonders how he got that high
The ******* with bedroom eyes
Looks the other way, and
The specialist in pantomime
Does not know what to say.
A hundred thousand looks at love
Not a single one survives
Yet, with regret and toil and sweat
We go on with our lives.
pwl 5/20/15

She loved and learned
I crashed and burned
I will crash and burn again
She told me I was immature
But I was younger then.
pwl 5/20/15

I choked on my apology
As I swallowed my pride
It was caustic -
Burned all the way down,
But she’s the one that lied.
She said she loved me
But she didn’t
She loved the actors we’d become.
Characters from movies,
Protagonists from plays,
Chasing happy endings
And winding through a maze
Of dead end streets and
Errant turns
Lost with no way out.
Captains of a windblown ship
No way to come about.

But we were close!
Our destination loomed,
A beacon showed the way
To avoid the waves and jagged rocks,
To reach the shore, and end the play.
To drink from calm, fresh waters
And soothe the burning in our throats,
Retire both our characters,
Build a castle with no moats.
Have the guards remove their armor, drop their shields,
And toss the helmets from their heads,
Put an end to all the fighting, and
Let the dreams chase us instead.
PwL  5/20/15

One tree frog singing
A thousand join the chorus
Soon silence returns

A guy named Jim from Delaware
Liked golfing in his underwear
Whatdya know and son of a gun
He finally got a hole-in-one
Guess he'll hafta get anotha pair!