"Buy a Star!
Own a Star!"
The sales are brisk,
For cross-eyed lovers,
Cross-hearted, lost,
Beneath the spinning constellations
Burning immortal exhalations,
Desiring forever oxytoxic bliss,
Burning ******* and hearts
Yearn longevity of stars....
PT Barnum saw his opportunity:
Sold cotton candy,
Hawked elephants,
Gawked dwarves,
Hid the razors from
Fierce bearded ladies,
Even sold the elephants' dung,
Provender to exotic gardens....
Barnum's packing up
The Pachyderms,
So Hawkers have us
Gazing on the stars....
"Step right up! See the stars!"
Purchase your fire in the sky!
Your lover's name,
Fixed in the firmament
A million years!
At least the cotton candy
And the elephant dung
Served some earthy, earthly good,
Paid dentists' children's college,
Fertilized the family food.
So now go claim a distant star,
A million, billion miles away,
Its light must make its journey
A thousand years or more
To greet your eyes, and yet,
Your lover's sighs predict
A hundred dollars' better spent
Than on a good Chablis,
Cementing mortal love in
Distant stars so permanent,
Visited through telescopic glass
Atop our rented tenements.