First of all, Jack, you were sent to the corner for a reason. That pie was for everyone, not just you, we have told you endlessly about how wrong selfishness is. You won’t listen. And how many times do we have to tell you to use a fork or a spoon. Not only did you ruin the pie, no one wants to eat what is left once you put your hand in it. And how are we supposed to get that stain off your white shirt? Good boy? Oh, no, anything but, so you are grounded for a week.
He does not want to hear it,
but someone needs to tell Jack
just how foolish this makes him look.
It shouldn’t require a degree
in hydrogeology or philosophical logic
to realize that water, like all matter
obeys the basic laws of physics,
the concept of gravity being a principal
that says you don’t climb to find water.
Some, quite unfairly it should be noted,
place the blame on Jill, as though Jack
was a starstruck boy taken by her beauty.
One went so far as to suggest that
the story would have had a different
ending, and no medical bills, if only Jack
had fallen for Gayle, or better still, Sally
for everyone knows how easy it is to fetch
water from a well in a dale or a valley.
The kid is late again today, but that
is sadly not unusual, the old man said.
I ought to get rid of him, but I know
he needs the job to feed his family.
In the meanwhile, I’ll now have
to hobble down to the meadow
and hope my collie, who’s as old as I,
is up to the job of herding sheep still.
And I know that he will only shrug
when I threaten to dock his pay
for the loss, hell, even just the profit
I lost on the corn the cows consumed.
I get that he’s tired, those late night
gigs at club in town, and I hear that
he’s thinking of joining a trio in Chicago,
though I have no idea how they ever
heard his playing out here in fly-over-ville,
but I guess I’d better let him get his rest,
for if he becomes a star, maybe he’ll
remember me in his first CD’s liner notes.
The one question that has never had
a proper answer still bothers me.
Actually it gives rise to multiple questions
which synergistically expand my displeasure.
I get she had a lamb, and I don’t question
why, nor why hers was little, full size lambs
are far more common, and seriously
what did she do, bleach it every few days?
But those are minor points, really, because
we all know Mary was truly nomadic
and a real urban girl, city to city with
as little time in the country as possible.
The real question is where she kept
whatever it was the lamb so badly wanted,
because lambs don’t willingly leave their
mothers and not for some female Svengali.
Several things you need to understand. First, and foremost, a waterspout is a term no one around here has used in centuries, unless you mean a tornadic columnar vortex of water, and trust me, we spiders avoid those like the plague. Shocking, I know, but with eight legs we cannot swim. At best some of us can skitter across the surface for a bit. Another thing, while my family, the Arachnidae come in many sizes, and while I am far from the largest, I am also far from the smallest. . So let’s stop with the itsy bitsy, shall we. But most importantly, it wasn’t a damn water spout, it was a water slide, and I went up the stairs and rode the water down. That is what you do on a water slide. And at a water park, no one really cares about the rain, we are all wet already. Though I must admit, riding the slides in the sun is certainly more pleasant.
Good lord, people would you get your facts straight. Yes, there were three of us, but one is now gone. He disappeared one night, though I think the cat got him. But that is as close to accurate as you got. Okay, we were all severely myopic, or I was, and they said they were too. But that is where you went off the rails. We weren’t running after anyone. When you are nearly blind you don’t chase things or people. They are large and don’t watch where they step. And their screams can be deafening. We smelled some fresh bread and went, by nose, to check it out. Didn’t get all that far before we each felt a sudden pain. It was like someone took an axe to our back side. It was all we could do to get away. But the bleeding stopped quickly enough, though the pain lasted for days. And we must take your word it was a carving knife, though it felt serrated to me. And no one was there after she ran from the room, screaming. Thank god home was along the baseboard so we could find our way, since they don’t make miniature white canes for the likes of us. But let’s be clear, no one saw us coming or going, no sightings at all, and that’s the whole story as we lived it.
I mean, seriously, did anyone really think that the Spratt marriage would ultimately last? Sure, the first couple of years were imagined bliss. And sure, their dietary desires did help them avoid almost all waste. But that big a difference, even if only seemingly in eating habits, foretells differences in other areas of life. He was a neatnik, she not so much. He didn’t mind, originally picking up after her, but after a dozen years, let’s face it, it got old. And she was tired of his comments about her diet. Sure, she had put on a few pounds of late, but that was part of aging. And really, she didn’t look that bad, not old and shrunken like he did. People in glass houses and all of that. And she was on the damned Keto diet, so at least she was trying. She knew it could not go on, so she reached out to an attorney. And it was the attorneys who picked their carcasses clean.
Little Jack Horner
sat in a corner
suffering from a severe
narcissistic personality disorder.
Old King Cole
was a merry old soul
and a merry old soul was he,
until he died from a combination
of cirrhosis of the liver
and emphysema.
Little Miss Muffet
sat on a tuffet
eating her curds and whey,
and had a blood cholesterol
count of well in excess of 250.
Four and twenty blackbirds
baked into a pie,
and when the pie was opened
the animal rights league
protested mightily.
The king was in his counting house
counting all his money,
the queen was in her parlor
eating bread and honey,
the people were in the streets
demanding social justice.
an old writer and his words 