[Henry Quince]

Well, if it’s chickens now...

<FONT >
From Walt Chicken’s Crossing a Brooklyn Street

It avails not, time nor place — distance avails not,
I am with you, you hens and roosters of a generation, or ever so many generations hence,
Just as you feel when you look on the traffic and road, so I felt,
Just as any of you is one of a living flock, I was one of a flock,
Just as you are alarmed by the clamour of the traffic and the swift flow, I was alarmed,
Just as you hop and bob on the curb, yet hurry to your sudden death, I hopp’d and hurried,
Just as you cluck’d at the numberless wheels of cars and the rumbling of fatal semitrailers, I cluck’d.
</FONT f>

[Lightning Bug]

Henry,
The Walt Chicken is a hoot!

Bugsy

[Catherine Chandler]

News Item Redux

Girls seldom make passes
At men with fat asses.

[Kate Benedict]

What a fab thread.

This one will be old news to many since I 'shopped it here & it's on my site, but I do wish I could have submitted it. They were not open to poems that had appeared online.

CAN'T GET NO

He came on like Mick Jagger but he’s no Mick Jagger.
—A disappointed groupie, after a tryst with Mick Jagger
---------------------------------------------------------


She was juicy and willing; he might as well shag her.
And so he maneuvered her up to his room.
He’s haughty, all right, but he’s no Mick Jagger.

He acted like Mick, with his strut and his swagger.
They snorted some coke and her heartbeat went boom.
She was juicy and willing, he might as well shag her.

She balked when he started to tie her and gag her.
She swore like a sailor; the rose lost its bloom.
He’s grotty, all right, but he’s no Mick Jagger.

He tripped toward the bed with his typical stagger,
sweaty and naked and thin as a broom.
She was present and willing, he might as well shag her.

She’s prey! Like a hunter he’d bang her and bag her.
The law of the jungle! The birds meet their doom.
He’s brutal, all right, but he’s no Mick Jagger.

His tongue didn’t lick and his tail didn’t wag her.
The night was a drag, man, a be-in of gloom.
There was no satisfaction; he just couldn’t shag her.
He’s naughty, all right, but he’s no Mick Jagger.

[Jerry Glenn Hartwig]

Kate

As soon as I stop LMAO, I'm going to be surprised and offended.

[Jerry Glenn Hartwig]

I never got around to fixing the metrics on this one, but I was once tempted to finish it and send it off...


The Wannabe

When darkness settles o'er the West
the working day is done;
when daylight's warmth has slipped away
with the setting of the sun,

the cowpokes sit around the fire
to recite the pedigree
of a fire-brand horse called Marble-eye,
and his rider Wannabe.

No one recalls his actual name
or precisely where he was from.
He wandered on the ranch one day
as green as green can come.

They asked him where he'd hailed from,
He said, "Yonder - way back east."
"Well, what the hell did you do back there?"
"I'm a respiratory therapist."

Now some of the cowpokes laughed at this
while others only snickered,
but Wannabe wasn't bothered at all,
for in his mind he pictured

himself a seasoned cowboy -
a hero tall and lean.
He mosey'd over to the corral
and squinting, surveyed the scene

of horseflesh - powerful mustangs - with
a semi-practiced eye;
the cowboys all stopped laughing
when he mounted Marble-eye.

Now Marble-eye was just as mean
as a kitten newly born,
and just to sit this hell-spawned beast
he gripped the saddle horn.

They bolted through an open gate,
across the fruited plain,
and sadly, so the story goes,
were never seen again.

But when the firelight flickers low,
the cows are bedded down,
the coyotes start their nightly howl,
that lonesome, soul-less sound,

a hideous shriek may pierce the night
and echo through the sky.
They say it's the sound of Wannabe
on that fire-brand Marble-eye.

[James Freethy]

My passion for you burns like the core of the earth,
And I can't wait to see it incinerate the skin from your beautiful face.
I would walk half-way around the world and more
To hunt you down and cut the organs out of your chest.
I'd search 1,000 gardens for 1,000 years
To find you the flower with the most potent poison.

Don't wear you heart on your sleeve.
I want it in a jar.
Your heart will be mine
Forevever whether it beats or not.

-Vladimir Singesce


(note: "-Vladimir Singesce" is part of the poem, any parallels with actual people named Vladimir Singesce are a hoped for and accidental coincidence)

[Suzanne Delaney]

Originally posted by David Anthony:
http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/ubbhtm...ML/000590.html

Please post here:
Anything you submitted to Poetry but was rejected, or
anything you would have submitted, but didn't get around to.

Here's my entry:

Under the Weather

I went to see the doctor since
I wasn’t feeling fit.
My head was hurting and my hands
were shaking quite a bit.
He asked me if I drank a lot
(the nosy little git).
I answered, “No, in fact I spill
the greater part of it.”

http://www.davidgwilymanthony.co.uk/

Hi David:
This is very funny
Am I allowed to participate now - posting in the Forum that is ?
I made my fifteenth post this morning but I was away for a year as I moved from Australia to Hawaii
and have not been really active in the Forum.
I did do quite a few in depth critiques in 2004 towards qualifying but on searching the archive none of them are showing up. I hope that doesn't disqualify me from meeting the requirements.

Do I wait for a week now and then get a notice in the email?
I'm not sure how it works.
Thanks for your consideration.

Cheers,
Suzanne



------------------
." Penetration to the meaning of a thing or process, as distinct from the ability to describe it precisely, involves a participation by the knower in the known."
Owen Barfield

[Marion Shore]

Just got this one back. The dweebs! I thought they might have had enough of a sense of irony and humor to take this one, as well as an appreciation of the cojones it took to send it!

BTW, this submission came back in record time. They might as well have used FedEx!


POETRY MAGAZINE VILLANELLE

It seems I can’t get into Poetry;
they turn me down however much I try,
and yet I keep submitting faithfully.

I haven't given up yet, nosiree,
although I always get the same reply:
“Sorry. We can’t use this. Poetry.”

It’s like a shining temple with no key;
a bright Olympus, much too steep and high
to climb, though I keep trying faithfully.

There’s an expression, “Vedi Napoli,
poi mori” (see Naples and then die)—
I'd change it to “Get into Poetry…”

It’s not the money (though they pay handsomely)—
it's the glory. I admit it (sigh),
that's why I keep submitting faithfully.

Behold, there lies that dread SASE
upon my doorstep! I gaze up at the sky,
praying it's a yes from Poetry.
If not, I'll keep submitting faithfully.

[David Anthony]

Hello Suzanne.

Good to see you here. Of course you can post in this thread, or anywhere else for that matter.

Such a pleasure, reading all these entries. 'Shag her/Jagger' made my day.

Best,
David