Poetry

“Simple Fare” by P.G. Wodehouse

I loathe all needless luxuries,
I loathe your regal bread and cheese
I also loathe with loathing utter
Your enervating bread and butter.

Give me a simple hearty fare
A boiled kidney here and there
Chateau Laffite and ancient port
Such is the fare I’ve always sought.

My friends declare I’m growing stout
My doctor darkly hints at gout
But till I seek the realms above
Such simple fare I’ll always love.

“Chaplinesque” by Hart Crane

​We make our meek adjustments,
Contented with such random consolations
As the wind deposits
In slithered and too ample pockets.

For we can still love the world, who find
A famished kitten on the step, and know
Recesses for it from the fury of the street,
Or warm torn elbow coverts.

We will sidestep, and to the final smirk
Dally the doom of that inevitable thumb
That slowly chafes its puckered index toward us,
Facing the dull squint with what innocence
And what surprise!

And yet these fine collapses are not lies
More than the pirouettes of any pliant cane;
Our obsequies are, in a way, no enterprise.
We can evade you, and all else but the heart:
What blame to us if the heart live on.

The game enforces smirks; but we have seen
The moon in lonely alleys make
A grail of laughter of an empty ash can,
And through all sound of gaiety and quest
Have heard a kitten in the wilderness.

“Plateau” by Curt Kirkwood

Many a hand has scaled the grand old face of the plateau
Some belong to strangers and some to folks you know
Holy ghosts and talk show hosts are planted in the sand
To beautify the foothills and shake the many hands

Nothing on the top but a bucket and a mop
And an illustrated book about birds
See a lot up there but don't be scared
Who needs action when you got words

You've finished with the mop then you can stop
And look at what you've done
The plateau's clean, no dirt to be seen
And the work, it was fun

Nothing on the top but a bucket and a mop
And an illustrated book about birds
See a lot up there but don't be scared
Who needs action when you got words?
​
Many hands began to scan around for the next plateau
Some said it was in Greenland and some say Mexico
Others decided it was nowhere except for where they stood
But those were all just guesses
Wouldn't help you if they could