Verses Serious

Sad Eulogy

He wasn’t too much
He wasn’t too little
Had a normal amount
At the ends and the middle

Women Scientists

Rosalind Franklin toiled away
While probing forms of DNA
Then Watson Crick without a song
“Borrowed” her data, that was wrong

Guardin’ Eden

I love to walk most every day
Along the road down Campus Way

Out through the covered bridge I stroll

Voices

Mother Nature’s lovely voice
Appeals at all our ages
Hearing it can cause rejoice
No matter what our stage is

Farmers

A farmer works all day a seedin’
To sprout some tiny cotyledons
Such toil in heat and rain and snow

Legal Lies

Under the guise of legality
Horrid things got done
The laws defining society
Affect us every one

Above the Clouds

What’s out beyond the clouds we see?
Way up so far above?
Does outer space have heaven’s grace
With ancestors that we love?

YesterDaze

Twinkle little star so faint
You’re out there, but I sure ain’t
The Tesla headed where you are
Made Elon ask “Dude, where’s my car?”

Make Merry

Make merry every single day
And you will chase the blues away
But if you choose instead to mope
There really isn’t any hope

Surviving

(published in Plants and Poetry)

Tiny mushrooms pushing through
Soil that’s all around you

Birthday Wish

A wonderful person I know
Is spending today all aglow
Having come to the Earth
This day with their birth

On Time

I went to bed too late last night
And woke up to an awful fright
But now it’s done, what can I say?
Tomorrow turned into today

Longevity

We want to live forever but
We’re limited, you see
From a stop watch that is wired into
Our biology

To Be or Not?

I had self doubts, late yesterday
A crisis existential
Am I for real or might I be
A dream, inconsequential?

For Daniel

Now Daniel, though I know your name
I don’t know you, but just the same
I write for you this science verse
I hope that it is not the worst

The Power of Prayer

“Pray for me,” the man declared
“I’m having surgery and I’m scared”

I asked him what a prayer could do

Two Way Protection

You have no mask upon your face
Inside this very public place
Perhaps you can’t afford a mask?
I’d give you one, if you would ask

To the Graduate

So it is graduation day
A time that once seemed far away
Now after this hip hip hooray
It’s time to do your thing

Now I Lay Me

Now I lay me down to sleep
With religious thoughts awake I keep

God gets credit for all that haps

Q&A

Question things that you get told
Never waver. Never fold
Don’t get left out in the cold
Just question

Waging Warfear

Humans went and conquered Earth
Killing most of the species here
With no animals left to point guns at
Everybody now lives in fear

The Wild Knight

So you had unprotected sex, oh did ya?
And now have a very bad case of chlamydia?

When will you learn, you oafish lout?

Tomorrow

They say tomorrow never comes
But it also never goes
The carrot on the stick positioned
Just before your nose

The Time Machine

Just looking around confused, it’s true
Traveling on the same time machine as you

This thing is crazy in regards to riding

True Love

That science is true
While doubters spin it
Has nothing to do
With believing in it

Self Awareness

I dove into my consciousness
And landed on my head
The truth that I desired just
Gave me surprise instead

Over and Over

Everything’s in cycles
That no one defeats
But why is it just awfulness
That history repeats?

Work/Life Balance

Summer is the season that
I eagerly await, for sure
There’s time off from my job, it’s clear
But work I must endure

The Prick

They stuck a needle in my arm
Protecting me from viral harm

Its tiny little RNA

Crap

Wallowing in emotion
The poet bemoans fate
Revealing it for everyone
“Cathartic,” they say. Great (?!?)

Sisyphus’ Law

When climbing the mountain of success
Remember as you seek
A slope has many marvels
That are not found on the peak

Different Perspective

A truly insightful person
Rarely gets into a bind
Because they don’t fight to change the world
When they just need to change their mind

Racism

Racism is a system
Unholy and unsacred
That removes the need to know someone
In order to engage in hatred

2022

It now is long past New Year’s eve
The time when many folks believe
Better things lie ahead

Advice

Here’s some advice
That I was told
“You need to stop playing”
“Before you get old”

War and Peace

In times of peace, sons bury fathers
When their time on Earth is done
When war occurs, the opposite’s true
Fathers bury their sons

I Cannot Not Knot

A company needed a worker
For which many folks did apply
After sorting through all applications
The boss settled on one young guy

Cycle of Life

Youth is a time
In the knowledge biz
Where you don’t need to learn
Cuz you know all there is

Beauty

Peacock feathers
To the world
Look rather plain
Until unfurled

Mythter

God’s on his way to becoming myth
So easy to deduce
It’s happened many times before
Perhaps you’ve heard of Zeus?

Limited Lease

Upon the Earth, your time’s not bought
You only get to rent it
And when the lease is up, my friend
No way you can extend it

Numbers

If you cannot count your blessings
Here is a thought for you
It’s usually cuz there’s too many
And not because there’s too few

Vacations

Pillaging gelato and souvenir stands
Clutching t-shirts in their hands
This is the part of vacation, I guess
Some people like the best

Invisibility

Some say that man’s invisible
But him I still can see
He only is invisible
To the party GOP

Corvallis Rap

Here are my thoughts. I’ve organized them
In hopes someone will super size them
North town, south town, east town, west
Just what will make Corvallis best?

Truth Was Laid to Rest

The truth has just been laid to rest
At the end of an illness long
The folks in power its passing blessed
The rest knew it was wrong

Mr. Z

So Mr. Z has gone away
And won’t be coming back
He died of something yesterday
Perhaps a heart attack

The Hot Rod

The red-hot Mustang loudly squealed
Too loud to be ignored
A teen-age mind behind the wheel
Had its gas pedal floored

Muhammed Ali

“Float like a butterfly”
“Sting like a bee”
Those were the words
Of Muhammed Ali

The Capitalist

You take from the Earth everything
But give nothing in return
Dirtying the air and water too
And forests all get burned

Once

(Someone on Facebook challenged people to tell “Once was more than enough” stories. This was my take on it.)

In school as just a youngster
My teacher - rather gruff

One Down

(For a friend who enjoyed crossword puzzles. Her name is embedded in the verse)

Love joined with a spirit
On the day that you were born. A

Prosperity

What’s the price of prosperity?
The answer is very strange
You pay for it with money
And get back climate change

All Puffed Up

You think you’re smoking when you’re smoking
Sucking on that ciggie
Envisioning Greta Garbo
The classic look of Twiggy

For Helen Reddy

You’re a woman we heard roar
Who just could not be ignored
And whose ballad was an anthem for all time
Nothing like it e’er before

Protests

When Rosa Parks made such a fuss
She had no problem with the bus

And Gandhi wasn’t being rude

Reruns

One disadvantage of getting old
Is watching history repeat
Seeing mistakes of the past unfold
While having a ringside seat

Vaccinate

Smallpox isn’t stopped with essential oils
And tetanus can’t be beat with organic soils
Rabies will kill despite the auras one sees
And cleansing and purging will not cure disease

True Freedom

Not worrying what others think
Is the greatest freedom of all
When you care, you empower them when they say
You’re too short, too fat, too tall

Imagined

(with thanks to John Lennon on 9/9/21)

It was 50 years ago today
Mr. Lennon taught the world to say

The God Thing

Why is it everyone thinks their god
Is the only one around?
In the written history of humans
There’s 5000 we have found

Deja View

It’s easy to be depressed
At the news on the street
Cuz it seems only the worst parts
Of history repeat

Lighten Up

The world is ugly and depressed
It needs more to renew it
Instead of sad sack poets
Adding negativity to it

America

Scrawny eagle flying high
O’er purple hills and plains
Dinnertime has gone awry
Little still remains

Love is a Cliché

Love is a cliche
That is getting very old
There’s nothing worse than heartbreak
Or so we’re often told

Modern Warfear

The soldiers fighting modern wars
Have silicon hearts, the generals rich
If you think today is bad, my friend
Tomorrow’s really gonna be a bitch

Modern Parenting

A toddler with her parents
May feel so all alone
If when she needs attention most
Her parents stare at phones

Patriotism

When it comes to
Patriotic matters
The harder that you wave a flag
The more it tatters

Drama Queens

There goes another drama queen
For whom a poem provides the means
For venting teenage spleen

The Root of Change

No snowflake makes an avalanche
No water drop a flood
And there is many a corpuscle
Inside a spot of blood

A Good Life

If people are happy when we arrive
And saddened when we leave
Then it is true within our life
There’s much we did achieve

Fascism

Every single fascist
From Hitler to the Shah
Did not respect the law as king
Instead, the king was law

Beauty

Beauty is not forever
It’s only nature’s kiss
So sadly we remember
Flowers wither, thorns persist

Life

Youth dies early
Aging lives on
Until the big stop sign
Says you can’t go on

Belief System

If belief had any power at all
We wouldn’t be able to fly
And way up there above us
Zeus would rule the sky

Hope

Hope is a tiny voice you hear
In the middle of a storm
Reminding that evening weather
Disappears by morn

Aging

I’m finding getting older
Is really not so much fun
There’s aches and pains and memory loss
Common to everyone

Unity High Toast

It’s good to be back to Illinois
My home when I was just a boy
The years have rapidly slipped by
When I spent time at Unity High

A Recipe

Fighting battles every minute
A way of life with no joy within it
Happiness you move toward
Only when you drop your sword

Frozen in Time

Please launch the hourglass of my life
Deep into outer space
So the sand in it will stop its falling
And I can stay in this place

Religion 101

He said to his friend
“God’s got a plan”
“A plan in store for me”

So his friend smacked him

TV Sports Fans

Why do TV sports fans need
Announcers to say what they see?
When they can see for themselves what happens
On their big screen TVs

Conformity

When you engage in conformity
I hear it’s true
That everyone loves you
But you

Uphill Battle

I was fighting an uphill battle
But after a while, I stopped
Cuz I realized that if I won
I would be on top

Luxury Tax

The cost of living keeps rising
Raising prices to the max
But not as bad as monetary wealth
With shortened lifespans and heart attacks

Capitalism 101

What is capitalism?
A modern rule of thumb
Is that it focuses on
Income rather than outcome
(and that’s the problem)

Equality

Equality’s just math, you see
No matter how it’s branded
And so it’s very clear to me
Why some don’t understand it

Wealth

Wealth is weird
No denying it
Some say, it’s money
But you can’t buy it

Why?

Working forty years did I
Stressing, fretting, scraping by
Why go through this fuss?
The answer - it was needed cuz
The price of money is high

Sanity

So many interesting personas
There are in the world, I find
Making me wonder if sanity
Is just a socially acceptable state of mind

For Jerry

Our good friend Jerry’s gone away
And we shall miss him every day
It’s thanks to him that we now know
How much good can fit in a soul

Dear Ellen

Dear Ellen:

Not much new ‘round here, I’d say
I took a long walk yesterday
Thinking about the season

Wait Lifter

A man found out
His overweight cause
Turns out his satellite dish
Picks up more than he does

Tiger Protection

False eyes on the back of their heads
Help protect tigers, it is said
Which gives me a very anxious thought
“Protect them from WHAT?”