THE PLUMBER

I’m no Mr. Fix It.

What needs repair is me!

At least I must try,

Or what good shall I be?

A water hose is broken

Beneath the kitchen sink.

Twenty years ago,

I’d fix it in a wink.

Pliers and a wrench,

A little muscle too,

A few moments work,

And, PRESTO! It’s like new!

But now there’s a hitch;

I must get down on the floor,

Squeeze into a cabinet.

Can I do it just once more?

The job at last gets done.

And now I need a crane

To get back on my feet!

My angry joints complain.

As I get ever older,

I may be getting dumber.

But, if hoses break again,

I will call the plumber!

MARK ROTHKO

Rothko’s work typifies

‘Art’ I really hate.

It qualifies as rubbish,

No matter how critics prate.

Anyone with sense,

From across the room or near,

Sees smears of paint on canvas.

Nothing more is clear.

Art that has appeal

To just some art-school spawn,

Critics, other ‘artists’,

Gallery hangers-on…

Isn’t art at all,

But merely mindless spew,

Dog-shit on the pavement.

Is the dog an artist too?

Rothko has no talent.

He’s a phony and a twit.

Send him to the minors!

He can’t run, throw or hit!

AN INSTANT IN TIME

The only time that’s real

Lasts but a millisecond.

It’s the here and now,

So brief it can’t be reckoned.

All else is past and future

That stretch to God knows where.

What does this insight mean?

Fuck all, I do declare!

REAMING OUT THE GARAGE

The garage is a handy place

To store some stuff away.

Things still in working order

That have seen a better day!

Old toys and appliances,

Clothes no more in style,

Tennis togs and scuba gear,

Unused for quite a while!

Travel souvenirs,

Tires and party games,

Hobby kits, puzzle bits,

Albums and picture frames.

Items of little value

Evoke ‘I remember when.’

Clutter of the now

Recalls a joyful then.

The garage is full of junk.

So we’re reaming out, you see,

A storage shed of memories.

To house an SUV!

THE BLANK PAGE

Here I am a-staring

At my blank computer screen,

What am I about to type?

What yet hasn’t been?

That’s the wonder of it all:

When the day is o’er

Something new has been created,

A work unknown before.

It may be only rubbish,

A silly childish rhyme,

But it’s an addition to the universe,

A product of its time.

Where does the impulse come from?

Another world some say.

But I am the agent;

I am the modeler’s clay.

It’s my raison d’être.

The meaning of my life.

In my dotage I have found

An antidote to strife.

FAREWELL MAYNE

It’s a place of summer sunshine,

Of restless wind and tide.

Beyond the rocky shore,

Squalling seabirds glide.

A tiny cabin nestles

Among the soaring firs,

A home away from home,

Recalled my full heart stirs.

Peace and quiet reign,

Urban clamour far away,

No surging crowds or traffic,

Just children at their play.

Island life is now behind me.

It was pure and simple joy.

But fate has intervened.

I dare not with fortune toy.

So farewell seductive Mayne.

I’ll ne’er visit you again.

Memories of your charms

Will until I die remain!

OUT OF CONTROL

How much do we control the courses of our lives?

I’m persuaded not at all; we go where fortune drives.

We have no word to say about where we are born,

Whether rich or poor, loved, cared for or forlorn…

What talents we may have, if full of health and zest,

Or feeble and afflicted, no match for any test.

Every incident of the day affects us, good or ill.

We respond as we must, no real thought or will.

Our freedom’s an illusion. We are cogs in a machine

Spinning aimless in the void, a vast eternal scene.