He is sitting on a coal mine, coal mine, coal mine
He is sitting on a coal mine, and everybody knows
that a raggedy fella would sell his uncle and his elbows
for a touch of gold, for a touch of gold.
Leave them be, those dreams of old.
The banks have tanks and rented soul.
They got holes, they got shells, they got oil in them wells,
but if he got a worry about the rent,
the crouching tiger is a mangonel,
a hidden dragon with the savoir faire.
Artificial in jelly pants, lying to a statue in Lyon, France
about all the katzenjammers that yestermorrow
faded away like sycophants on a vision quest,
hills o’ white elephants remember rest.
The quiet lumps, wise old heads do it best.
The mountains, the warp, the shed, the loom,
the bread, a shadow benign, a watcher behind the gloom.
The woofer and his beardo
sleep in an alley with a dollar in his pocket between them,
but only one wakes up.
Died with the dog guarding his eye socket, alas.
Murder got a nibble; they took a bulbous beylic,
Snatched that meal for the fledglings.
A little gravel and grace from drinker that knows things,
A sight to see, yes, indeed.
A squared off turdbot with a capital T,
Feed the beaks of corvine babies.
They say you’ve never lived
until you’ve vomited
the eyeball of a broken wino
into the mouths of oh-so
tiny birds.
Hard pass.
The obituary was long and storied.
The long-forgot master of fireworks
Whose work gave us oohs and aahs on special nights.
His factories fed towns; his banks sped the nation
towards prosperity. His rockets flew to heights,
to victory claimed by no one.
Died in an alley in Baltimore, nevermore
to drink MD 202/20.
Consumed by the fire in the war,
It doesn’t matter which one.
Hard to say if anyone won.
His kids showed up, all fifteen of them.
None of them were nice.
His niece commissioned a statue of him
To be built downtown.
But the money was misspent by a cabal
of disheartened former software designers
Who had been hired by Hexagonville to bring
Aqua vitae to new hulls, to beans and boats,
But they blew the money to blacken their eyes for Tik Tok fame with kohl,
and the beauties just sit there and stare.
The dull jewels in dark pits.
The repos and gits, the hypergolics.
No one checked the eye shadow, shadow
The haves and the hair nets,
Signs of lost pets,
Go unnoticed.
Fifty State Banana 