These last days of spring
we are aging together,
this old cat and I. - Jeff Barnes
Wednesday, June 11, 2025
Wednesday, April 30, 2025
Tuesday, April 29, 2025
Instructions for My Funeral
I want my funeral to be a celebration of my life.
I absolutely forbid anybody to mourn.
Don't show up with sorrowful faces.
It should be a happier day than the day I was born.
Monday, April 28, 2025
Mr. Green
I knew a man named Mr. Green
who was crusty, irksome, and downright mean.
He was always venting his spleen
about how he hated the color green.
Sunday, April 27, 2025
Saturday, April 26, 2025
Word Salad Villanelle
This poem is nothing but word salad.
Don't expect it to make any sense.
This is by no means a coherent ballad.
Friday, April 25, 2025
Pope George Ringo I
We need to have a pope named George Ringo.
We've already had two named John Paul.
So say the old ladies playing church bingo.
Thursday, April 24, 2025
A Star is Not Born
I thought we could be a duo,
her screech accompanying my guitar.
That was my naive teenage dream
of becoming an avant-garde rock star.
Wednesday, April 23, 2025
Contrast
It's less impressive
than how the cannons
in the 1812 Overture
added a cadence of destruction
Tuesday, April 22, 2025
Dad
I never lived my life
the way you wanted me to.
I was determined to be myself
and not at all like you.
Monday, April 21, 2025
Caleb Cabotage
Caleb Cabotage's head is made of cabbage
and he has a big strawberry for a nose.
He has a taco shell for a mouth
and he wears flour tortillas as clothes.
Sunday, April 20, 2025
1969
I stood on the bridge to watch
white boats on a river of wine.
It was 1969.
A warm breeze was blowing.
I wanted to go where they were going.
Saturday, April 19, 2025
The Other Conqueror Worm (with apologies to Edgar Allan Poe)
We sat in the crowded theatre
waiting for the curtain to rise.
We came to see a play about a man
who wrongly believed himself wise.
Friday, April 18, 2025
Upside Down Bowie
I was fourteen,
in the passenger seat
of my older sister's
blue Volkswagen Beetle
on a curvy, hilly,
and wet Route 19
just outside of
Mount Morris, Pennsylvania.
Thursday, April 17, 2025
Sebastian and Shiloh: A Silly Love Story
When Sebastian first saw Shiloh she was riding a scooter
and wore her pet peacock on her head.
At that moment he wished to be her suitor
and hoped that someday they would wed.
Wednesday, April 16, 2025
April
April Fool's Day
is the perfect herald
for this flighty month
when you might sweat
in your garden
or cocoon yourself
on an Easter
that feels more like
Christmas.
It's like a fickle child
or an unreliable friend,
a trickster spirit
or a volatile lover. - Jeff Barnes
Tuesday, April 15, 2025
What Land is This?
What land is this where the sun is green
and trees float in the sky,
where pink horses and purple rabbits
jump off mesas and fly,
Monday, April 14, 2025
Sunday, April 13, 2025
Maggie
She's not a Holstein cow, she's a cat.
Her fur is a pattern of white and black.
She is quite nimble though she is fat.
Saturday, April 12, 2025
The Misfit Merfolk
This is the realm of the misfit merfolk.
We have human legs and the heads of fish.
We don't do the butterfly or backstroke.
Friday, April 11, 2025
Ed Wood vs. Ezra Pound
I'd rather watch a movie by Ed Wood
than read any of Ezra Pound's verse.
Film critics may say Ed's films are no good,
but I think Pound's poems are infinitely worse.
Thursday, April 10, 2025
Projections
the alarm clock rings. - Jeff Barnes
Wednesday, April 9, 2025
Just Before Easter
Tuesday, April 8, 2025
October Ghazal
I was born on a rainy day in October,
specifically Halloween, the climax of October.
I've left my spirit to dwell in October.
Monday, April 7, 2025
Why I Can't Be a Song
To be a song
|would require me to be open
and accessible to anyone
who happened to be around,
you name it.
Sunday, April 6, 2025
Orange
I still smile
when I think of a whimsical
picture done in crayon
I saw years ago,
depicting you as the sun
rising or setting, who know which,
over city buildings,
dyeing the sky
various shades of your color,
Saturday, April 5, 2025
Friday, April 4, 2025
Laughing Buddhas
The big black one
brings memories
of my fat black cat,
the gentlest pet
I ever had.
Thursday, April 3, 2025
Verse Things Waiting
I couldn't be a psychologist
because I'm the one who's crazy,
nor could I be a manual laborer
for I am weak and lazy.
Wednesday, April 2, 2025
Turkey Buzzard
I thought you would have
noticed my approach but,
so absorbed were you in your meal
you didn't even look up
until I was almost upon you
and honked my horn,
catching an all too brief look
at the sweeping span of your black wings
and the redness of your comically menacing head
as you flew off to the side,
seemingly vexed at the interruption
rather than frightened at the prospect
of becoming roadkill yourself. - Jeff Barnes
Tuesday, April 1, 2025
Mr. Costello and Winnifred
Mr. Costello
is completely yellow.
He's quite a mellow fellow
who plays the cello
and loves lemon Jell-O.
Monday, March 31, 2025
Portrait of Elon
In his visage you won't find
a single tender feature,
not even the confused innocence
of Victor Frankenstein's creature.
Monday, January 27, 2025
How Mrs. Potato Head Got Her Groove Back
After
years of therapy
and
reading pop psychology books,
Mrs.
Potato Head came to realize
that
she was married
to
a narcissist.
Most
people thought
that
Mr. Potato Head was
a
wonderful guy because
he
had been amusing children for years,
unaware
that he secretly despised them.
They
might have been shocked to learn
that
he had two sprouts of his own,
after
his secret affair with the sweet potato
in
the next row of the garden,
and
afterwards he completely
disowned
these tater tots and
would
have nothing more to do
with
their mother.
Years
after they were married,
Mrs.
Potato Head found out
about
this indiscretion, but she
forgave
him because he was,
after
all, a young spud whose lust
overpowered
his judgment.
And
she kept on forgiving him
for
his indiscretions,
his
temper tantrums,
his
petty tyranny
and
his broken promises.
But
it was the neglect
that
hurt the worst.
He
liked to be seen
with
her in public, and
in
films and commercials
but
only because she
made
him look good.
People
constantly
told
them they were a cute couple
and
that fed his ego.
But
in their private life
he
ignored her most of the
time,
preferring to
hang
out with Oscar the Orange
and
Pete the Pepper,
and
more than once she caught him
ogling
Cookie Cucumber and Katie Carrot.
One
day in October
she
realized that she didn't need
him,
and she decided to leave.
She
packed up various
accessories
-- shoes, extra mouths,
eyes,
arms and everything that would
fit
in her car, and she left.
As
she was driving
on
a lonely stretch of highway
she
saw something in
the
distance -- a figure lying
on
the gravel by the
guard
rail. She pulled over
and
saw that it was a banana.
She
thought it might have been
tossed
out of a car window
or
fallen off a fruit truck.
She
rummaged through
her
trunk, pulled out extra pairs
of
eyes, ears, arms, legs
as
well as a nose and mouth,
which
she put on the banana.
The
banana breathed,
blinked
his eyes, and smiled
at
Mrs. Potato Head.
She
smiled back at him
and
they both kne
they
had instantly fallen in love.
She
helped the banana,
whom
she named Byron,
to
his feet and into the
passenger
seat of her car.
She
got behind the steering wheel
and they drove off
into their new life together. - Jeff Barnes