Wednesday, April 30, 2025

Haiku

Don't delude yourself.
It would carry you away.
Cat watches a hawk. - Jeff Barnes

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.

Don't play lugubrious, funereal music
and don't fill the room with the sounds of your sobs.
I want plastic skeletons to dangle from the ceiling,
merrily dancing to Saint-Saenz's "Danse Macabre."

I couldn't stand to be in a suit and tie
with everybody standing around my coffin staring.
Dress me in jeans and a Grim Reaper t-shirt.
That's what I would like to be wearing.

Laugh and tell each other grim jokes.
Don't stand around all teary-eyed.
I want you to dance to Terry Teene's "Curse of the Hearse"
as they come to load me in for my last ride. - Jeff Barnes

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.

He paved his yard with concrete
to avoid having grass.
He thought Kermit the frog
was nauseating and crass.

Every year on March 17th
he hid himself away.
He couldn't stand the sight of people
dressing for St. Patrick's Day.

The very sight of broccoli
gave him a sense of dread.
He always shunned green apples
and only ate the red.

Even when he was a child
he would pout and sulk
if anyone gave him a comic book
featuring the Incredible Hulk

He said he'd rather starve than eat asparagus,
broccoli, or avocado toast.
He thought of changing his name until he realized
it was himself that he hated most. - Jeff Barnes

Sunday, April 27, 2025

Haiku

Driving down the road
remembering gone places --
April afternoon. - Jeff Barnes

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.

I question whether any logic is valid.
Mmm! Take a whiff of that frankincense!
This poem is nothing but word salad.

That bust of Pallas looks rather pallid.
It has a fly on its head, like Mike Pence.
This is by no means a coherent ballad.

My years have taught me to be utterly callid.
I find my neighbors to be extremely dense.
This poem is nothing but word salad.

This is my pet myogalid.
I decided to name her Hortense.
This is not a coherent ballad.

The moth flying overhead is a pyralid.
I'm just a fool sitting on a fence.
This poem is nothing but word salad.
This is by no means a coherent ballad. - Jeff Barnes

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.

We want someone colorful, like a pink flamingo
and well-rounded, like a rubber ball.
We need to have a pope named George Ringo.

He can be Asian, African, Mexican or Gringo.
Nationality does not matter at all.
So say the old ladies playing church bingo.

He could be an Australian living among dingoes,
all alone in the outback sprawl.
We need to have a pope named George Ringo.

He could be the bishop of Santo Domingo.
Perhaps he would answer the call.
So say the old ladies playing church bingo.

This is what we need, by gosh, by gum, by jingo!
It doesn't matter if he's thin, fat, short, or tall.
We need to have a pope named George Ringo.
So say the old ladies playing church bingo. - Jeff Barnes

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.

I learned every chord I could,
majors, minors, sharps, and flats.
She shrieked along while I played.
She was like the Yoko Ono of cats.

Eventually the harsh truth hit me.
It became all too clear
that she was not singing along.
My playing was painful to her ears.

I gave up the guitar and she was happy.
She spent her days purring on my bed
While I sat quietly at my desk
writing poetry instead. - Jeff Barnes

Wednesday, April 23, 2025

Contrast

It's less impressive
than how the cannons
in the 1812 Overture
added a cadence of destruction

The songs of the birds
flow through the backyard
punctuated by sounds
of the neighbors' construction. - Jeff Barnes

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.

I was never the son
you wanted me to be.
now you are a box of ashes
forever unclaimed by me. - Jeff Barnes

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.

He has pierogis for ears
and spaghetti for his hair.
He rubs tomato sauce in it
when he wants to look debonair.

His hands are fingered citron
and he loves to play the cello.
His eyes are two big lemon slices.
He sees the world in shades of yellow.

He's got licorice sticks for his arms and legs,
so he is quite agile and wiry.
Onions and peppers are his favorite foods,
hence his breath tends to be rather fiery.

He has slices of pizza for his feet
and a giant pumpkin for a torso.
He's not quite sure of his weight
but estimates it at 200 pounds or so.

He has a top hat and walking stick.
On strolls he is quite jaunty looking.
But when he stays in the sun too long
it smells like the whole neighborhood is cooking. - Jeff Barnes

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.


Nobody knew where I was
and I didn't want them to know.
I just wanted to go.
I didn't want anyone to wake me
before the white boats could take me.

I was ten years old
looking up at the earthshine.
It was 1969.
I wondered about planets orbiting the stars
and said, "I want to be where they are."

I stood in the backyard at night
and watched the lights of an airplane in flight,
wishing it were a spaceship
that could take me to where it was going,
someplace beyond my knowing.

I looked at the hills in the distance
as dusk was falling.
I imagined voices calling.
Every day I waited in vain for a sign.
It was 1969. - Jeff Barnes

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.

And as the show got started
we heard his daughter's tale
of how he used a chainsaw
to cut off the head of a beached whale,

and his own retelling of how
he thought it would be a lark
to put the body of a dead bear cub
on a bicycle in Central Park.

This play is a prime example
of theatre of the bizarre,
whose main character disdains science
and yet is head of the HHR.

He sits proudly among his colleagues
all of them scoundrels and  knaves.
If his father could see him now
he would be spinning in his grave.

Beware the damage this man might do
before the end of his term,
for the play is the tragedy "RFK, Jr."
and its hero the Conqueror Brainworm. - Jeff Barnes

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.

David Bowie was on
the eight-track tape deck
when my sister
took a curve too fast.
I saw the countryside
go bottom up
and realized that
the car was rolling over.

It stopped just short
of going over
an embankment.

The Beetle was totaled
with shattered glass
and a caved-in roof.
My sister was unharmed
and I escaped with
a small cut and a bump
on my head.

I still flash back, sometimes,
to the moment when I saw,
through a cracking windshield,
the world turn upside down
accompanied by the cadence
of David Bowie
singing "Rebel, Rebel." - Jeff Barnes

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.

He bowed to her and removed his purple bowler hat
which had an orange tulip growing out the top.
She told him she owned a high-tech laundromat
and he told her he owned a secondhand bookshop.

She introduced him to Smithers.
That was her peacock's name.
He told her he was in love with her
and hoped that she felt the same.

She said she liked men who were quirky and weird
and more than a little bit nutty.
Just then a sugar glider emerged from his beard.
Sebastian said, "This is Cosmo, my buddy."

That won Shiloh over right away
and she agreed that they should marry.
She said, "Let's do it on National Gorilla Suit Day,
which is the thirty-first of January."

They got married wearing gorilla suits
and served bananas at the wedding reception.
Their wedding night is the date they attribute
as the date of their child's conception.

Nine months later as a nightingale crooned
on a cloudless Halloween,
their daughter was born under the full moon
and so they named her Selene. - Jeff Barnes

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,

where fish dance on the river's surface
just like tiny ballerinas,
and a frog poet sits on a rock
writing sonnets and sestinas,

where the moon sings ethereal songs
as the stars dance all around her,
and a giant blue cat watches for spaceships
hoping for a close encounter?

What land is this? Where is it?
I guess we'll never know.
Humans are not allowed there.
It's a place where we can't go. -Jeff Barnes

Monday, April 14, 2025

Haiku

Agitated cat
watches birds at the window.
Tail swings like a whip. - Jeff Barnes

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.

She looks like she wears a Mickey Mouse hat.
Don't ever dare to give her any flack.
She's not a Holstein cow, she's a cat.

She's never caught a mouse or a rat.
She prefers cat treats as a snack.
She is quite nimble though she is fat.

She never leaves dead critters on the doormat.
She's never been one to mount an attack.
She's not a Holstein cow, she's a cat.

She can play up her cuteness. She has that down pat,
especially when she rolls on her back.
She is quite nimble though she is fat.

She jumps off the bed and comes down with a splat,
then runs down the hall as though it's a racetrack.
She's not a Holstein cow, she's a cat.
She is quite nimble though she is fat. - Jeff Barnes

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.

We don't freestyle or do the breaststroke.
Around our bodies the currents swish.
This is the realm of the misfit merfolk.

Neptune and Poseidon are the gods we invoke.
Under our feet we feel the sand squish.
We don't do the butterfly or backstroke.

Normal merfolk consider us a joke,
but to be great swimmers is not our wish.
This is the realm of the misfit merfolk.

We walk on two legs just like earth folk
while above our heads the normal merfolk whish.
We don't do the butterfly or backstroke.

We're not invited when the normal merfolk convoke.
They've always been elitist and standoffish. 
This is the realm of the misfit merfolk.
We don't do the butterfly or backstroke. - Jeff Barnes

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.

Tor Johnson was a better sidekick than Papiols,
though he wasn't what you'd call a jongleur.
He was not meant to play the degrading role
of minstrel to a bloodthirsty warmonger. 

Your "Cantos" aren't nearly as entertaining
as Bela Lugosi fighting an octopus in a swamp;
in fact, I find them quite tedious and draining,
overflowing with pretentiousness and pomp.

Find someone else to listen to your views on race.
I'll be watching "Plan 9 from Outer Space"! - Jeff Barnes

Thursday, April 10, 2025

Projections

Maybe I'm projecting
but when I look 
at the woods out back
I feel the frustration
of the trees,
at being wet and still
leafless in the cold,
impatient for spring
to feel like spring,
not the tail end of winter.

Or possibly I've got it wrong
and they are in no hurry.
Perhaps they, like me,
are just reluctant to wake up
and anticipate their blooming
with the same disinclination
I have to rise when
the alarm clock rings. - Jeff Barnes 

Wednesday, April 9, 2025

Just Before Easter

The sky is clear and cheerful
garnished with a calm breeze.
Plastic eggs in various colors
hang on the bare branches of trees.

The air is a little bit snappy,
though the day is bright and sunny.
All around the lawns are adorned
with inflatable smiling bunnies.

Seasonal flags hang on houses
all up the street and down
as trim lawns cover the mean-spirited
underside of this town. - Jeff Barnes

Tuesday, April 8, 2025

October Ghazal

I was born on a rainy day in October,
specifically Halloween, the climax of October.

Every year I suffer the hot summer,
impatiently awaiting the dawn of October.

When I wake up on the first of November
I've left my spirit to dwell in October.

I surround myself with Halloween decor.
All year long I live in my own October.

Every autumn equinox I feel an awakening
and know I will be fully alive in October. - Jeff Barnes

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,

to shed all inhibitions
like a streaker running down
a busy street,

to leave my place
of comfort and flow
out into the open,
emerging from who knows
how may speakers in who knows
how many homes, cars,
PA systems, music venues,
you name it.

I could never
impose on people
in such a way.

I prefer to be like a poem
or story in a forgotten book
on a dusty shelf,
waiting for someone
to seek me out
or, finding me by chance,
consider it a happy accident. - Jeff Barnes

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,

and as I hold you
in my hand I can't help
but imagine you that way,
cliched though it may be,
as a little sun.

Under your skin you are
soft and yielding,
your taste a little burst
of madness flowing over
my tongue, and as I think of
that silly old picture
some of your juice
comes out my nose
as I gurgle with laughter. - Jeff Barnes

Saturday, April 5, 2025

Haiku

Like a fast food joint --
gobble up and go away!
My wife's bird feeder. - Jeff Barnes

Friday, April 4, 2025

Laughing Buddhas

The big black one
brings memories
of my fat black cat,
the gentlest pet
I ever had.

Four on a pop art poster
smile at me from the wall
as I sit on the couch and read.

One astride an elephant
reminds me not to be
fixed in place,

while the one on the dashboard
bobs his head to the music
as I drive down the highway.

Two sit on shelves
with their walking sticks
and bags of who knows what,
as they guard all my books
and various curios,

while the faux jade one
sits on the dresser
and glows in the dark,
happy to be a lodestar 
who sees us through
the night. - Jeff Barnes

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.

I wish I had been born
a rich lady's spoiled black cat.
I'd love to be a ghost in a haunted house,
but I'd have to be dead for that.

I've worked at all sorts of jobs
but I never managed to fit in.
It might be nice to be a vampire
but first I'd have go get bitten.

I couldn't be an engineer or accountant,
a teacher, a doctor, or a nurse.
The only thing I am qualified for
is writing silly verse. - Jeff Barnes

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.

He fell in love with Winnifred
who is completely red
and has a level head.
The two of them wed
and eventually bred.

They had a daughter who was not yellow like Mr. Costello,
nor was she red like Winnifred.
She was orange instead,
but since orange has no rhyme
they simply named her Clementine. - Jeff Barnes