Category Archives: Humor

Confessions of a Retired Superheroine (Day 14, NaPoWriMo) (really dumb, I know, but at least I did the prompt!)

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This is the prompt: “I challenge you to write a persona poem — that is, a poem in the voice of a particular person who isn’t you. But I’d like you to choose a very particular kind of person. How about a poem in the voice of a superhero (or a supervillain)?”

Confessions of a Retired Superheroine

What’s happening tomorrow?
the same thing that happens every Friday
since I was forced into retirement last year.
I’m going to go make my collections.

It will be my first day
off the diet
I’ve been on for a week––
and my leathers aren’t at all as close-fitting
as they were before,
so I deserve a small reward.

I’ve washed my hair—
Well, no surprise. I do every day.
A bit OCD on that activity,
but today I washed all of it.
Every inch.
Ears, too.

I can’t remember when I first thought
of the lucrative business
I’ve been opurrrrrrrating since my retirement;
but I do remember that tomorrow is the day
I go from door-to-door doing collections.

I usually dress in leathers,
which I look pretty good in for a mature sex-kitten.
No, not a biker chick.
I am more of a femme fatale
with a haunting and mesmerizing voice.
Everyone says it sends chills down their back–
a sort of backyard Les Mis.

My parking garage is six blocks away,
so I take a shortcut: leaping over walls,
soft-toeing it along the top edge of fences.

Sometimes I crouch in the bushes,
waiting for strangers to pass.
As I do, I sharpen my fingernails—
a weapon no one can take away from me.
Anyway, what good would a gun be
for a woman with no opposable thumbs?
Hey. Don’t feel sorry for me, okay?
I’m Puurrrrrfectly happy with my lot in life.
I’m puurrrrfect without them.

Sushi? Yes.
A trip to the beach? No.
Not unless there is raw fish involved
that I don’t have to catch myself!

I’m a night person.
I sleep for most of the day
and go out every night.

I am sexy, fit and nimble.
I fill out my leathers in all the right places.
I can jump to the ground from a rooftop,
land on my feet and be off before you see
any more of me than a shadow.
I am a thief by birth and inclination, and I
I pre”fur” my daily fare to be purrrrrrloined.

I can take swift revenge and kill mercilessly,
or curl up and enjoy
a long petting session,
as docile as you please.

Actually, I don’t know why I’m giving you this sales pitch.
I usually ignore people,
so when I actually notice them,
they are honored.

The diet? Well, low-protein, low carb and low fat.
That leaves nothing but grass, right?
And the problem with that is that everyone thinks you are sick
and so tries to trick you into a dose of this or that.
The cod liver oil isn’t bad,
but I’ve never developed a taste for Pepto Bismol.
My neighbor sneaked some into my cream a few months ago
and I gagged so hard I coughed up a hare-ball.
Just the nose and whiskers, actually, but it created a sensation, nonetheless.
I was at a party and no one was yet drunk enough
to take it in their stride.

Anyway, I’ve gotten distracted.
I’m just going to smooth my hair a bit
and then go to bed and get rested up
for tomorrow’s collections.

What kind of brilliant female was I to create a job for myself like this?

“Cat Woman Pest Disposal––You trap them, we collect them.”

I actually get paid for going from door to door,
collecting a course here and a course there.
No of course, no matter how hungry I am after my week’s fast,
I will not reward myself in my client’s presence.
I always wait until I get to my catmobile to have my first nibble.
After all, even a retired superheroine has to watch her image.

If Nothing but Truth Were Possible (Day 12 of NaPoWriMo)

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“Write a poem consisting entirely of things you’d like to say, but never would, to a parent,
lover, sibling, child, teacher, roommate, best friend, mayor, president, corporate CEO, etc.”

If Nothing but Truth Were Possible

Your child is not as charming as you think he is.
Perhaps if you just said, “No!” to him now and then?

I’m allergic to dogs. Could you get your St. Bernard off my lap, please,
and lock him out of the room where we’re sitting?

As much as I enjoyed the first hundred of your family photos,
could we perhaps move on to conversation of a less familial theme?

My husband has seen enough of your cleavage for one evening. Could you cage them?

Your poem’s triteness is only equaled by its misspellings.

I can see why you would want to be a swinger. Someone as gross as you are
should not expect his wife to shoulder all the responsibility.

Walmart art does not really count as a collection.

Whether your rocks are cubic zirconium or diamonds, they are still ugly!!!

Why would you bring $100,000 worth of diamonds to Mexico
and expect them not to be stolen?

When people back away from you, there’s a good chance
they don’t want you to advance on them again.

A good way to check for bad breath is to lick your wrist.

Have you ever wondered why only beautiful women want you to ask them to dance?

If you expect things in Mexico to be just like they were in the U.S., please remember
that there is a country just north of the border that is the U.S.!! Why don’t you go there?

No I am not ill. I’ve just spent two years starving myself and spent a fortune
on appetite suppressants. Couldn’t you just tell me I look fabulous?

Be honest now. Would you ever have thought to eat raw fish if it weren’t all the rage?

Your life depends on telling the truth. Do you you really, truly enjoy opera?

Just what is it you find enchanting about Paris? Oh, right. It must be the friendly people!

Tanks or Tankas? Day 11 of NaPoWriMo–and with 11 1/2 hours to spare!

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A tanka is a verse form of five lines following the pattern of 5-7-5-7-7 syllables. This poem consists of nine tankas that deal with the question, “Does might make right or does write make might?”

Tanks or Tankas?

It is such pleasure
lying in my morning bed,
I forsake those “shoulds”––
pool aerobics and the gym––
save them for another day.

As I exercise
that switchboard of all muscles,
the marvelous brain,
ideas are pumped like barbells
to create a well-toned verse.

Iron man or sage––
which will win and which will lose?
Is it brain or brawn
that moves our species forward
to survive this crazy race?

Our laptops used for
what––as pens or weaponry?
Which serves us better
in this age’s lethal match
for survival, power, wealth?

Which moves us forward?
Philosopher? Iron Man?
Poet? Soldier? Jock?
Which insures our progress toward
a place as Darwin’s fittest?

Physical fitness
in contemporary thought
wins most of the points
to insure a lengthy life
(and a husband or a wife).

but:

They also serve who
sit and wait upon their bums,
writing out their odes
by recording just what comes.
So now you need to tell us

which of these will win:
the muscle man or soldier
or the poet’s pen?
If muscle is your power
If you think that it will win,

please now consider:
the leg may be the longest
of your muscles, but
the largest strongest muscle
is the one you sit upon!

Excuses, Excuses (Day 8 of NaPoWriMo)

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Excuses, Excuses

On day eight,
my poem was late.
Alas, there was no time
for any type of rhyme
let alone ottava
before my java.
Then, once my day had started,
I fussed and arted.
The time just wasn’t prime
to pen iambic rhyme––
no variety of verse
long or terse,
rhymed or blank
in my memory bank.

Later in the day, I had to rap
with friends newly arrived, and then a nap
consumed my time for two more hours,
then flowers
to water and a swim to take.
My day, in short, a piece of cake
but nonetheless, no time in it
for having writ.

A dinner invitation was what next
usurped my plans to ponder over text.
Chiles relleno made my life replete
as finally, I reached iambic beat.
A game of dominos was next to steal
my writing time—no time for me to deal
with beats and stanzas,let alone with rhyme.
Quite bluntly, then—there isn’t always time
to meet my obligations versical.
My day, in short, grew worsical
in terms of my poetic obligation,
as I let down the NaPoWriMo nation.

By now the clock had crept
to twelve and then it leapt
to two AM. That’s when I left
my friends bereft
as I deserted them to go and write.
I braved aloneness and the night,
approached my desk and plainly reckoned
to take pen in hand—but then my pool beckoned.
Through the window how the moon
caressed it’s surfaces, and all too soon,
it was more than just a whim.
I had to swim.
That is why
I am one shy
and do not have a
r i m a   o t t a v a ! ! ! ! !

 

NaPoWriMo Day 7: The Invitation

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The prompt today for NaPoWriMo is to write a poem where every line is a declarative sentence and the last line is a question. I have changed the order of the prompt.

The Invitation

“You are invited to a party at our house, Saturday at 7.
Please bring a dish to share and what you want to drink.”

Another invitation for Pot Luck–
what the f—?
I’m to bring a dish to share and what I want to drink.
This makes no sense at all is what I think.
If I’m going to cook a dish and buy some wine,
I’ll just stay home, where all of it is mine!
Folks, a party is for entertaining friends––
Not the other way around! My poem now ends!

Saving Daylight

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I live in Mexico. We just changed over to DST today—a few weeks after the U.S. did. As though DST isn’t complicated enough, countries get to arbitrarily decide when to switch to it. Obviously, this poem was written during the fall switchover, not the spring.  I’ve never been able to remember which is switching on, which switching off.  At any rate, this is not my daily NaPoWriMo poem as it wasn’t written today.

Saving Daylight

After altering the course of rivers,
moving or removing coastlines,
forests, ozone-protection,
minerals and fossil fuel,
we look for what next to change
and notice time.

(Perhaps time, a manmade concept anyway,
can be less-devastatingly tampered with?)

There are those who know
better than God or nature
when light is needed
and they have set the world right.

We are saving daylight
all over the world,
taking it from the morning’s wallet
and transferring it
to a back pocket.

Led like blind lambs,
we change our clocks,
lost in dark mornings
so games of golf or tennis
can be played well past
the natural end of day.

Gardeners and house builders
climb the hills to work
lighting their ways with flashlights,
in search of that lost morning hour of light.

Like sheep made clumsy, stumbling over stiles,
schoolchildren’s toes
feel for cobblestones in the dark
between street lamps
spaced a block apart.

as, like investors too anxious
to save up for a rainy day,
a world in the dark
makes forced deposits every morning,
withdraws them, interest free, each evening.
Her animals and birds and tribes
lost to schemes
carefully planned.

NaPoWriMo Day 6- Just in Time

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I Promised NaPoWriMo

(or: Why you should never drink tequila when you haven’t finished your daily poem yet.)
11:09 P.M., April 6, 2013

Toss in the tequila
ice cubes and a lime.
Put it in a blender
and mix it for a time.

Put salt on your glass rim.
Pour the liquid in.
Take a little sip now.
Drinking’s not a sin.

If I hadn’t had two
with my evening meal,
I’d be writing verse now
you could take for real.

But Margarita got me
and holds me prisoner now.
I couldn’t engineer a poem.
I can’t remember how.

If you’ve a mind to scold me,
please don’t do it now.
I need to write something
to stay true to my vow.

There are laws against drunk driving
and driving while you’re stoned,
but nothing that forbids you
from writing when you’re zoned.

So please forgive this sad and
paltry little rhyme.
They need to make drunk writing
A misdemeanor crime.

To save you from the souls like me
who dare to take up pen,
disregarding just what
condition they are in.

You should give us pillows
and send us to our beds.
Remove our clothes, take off our shoes
and pat us on our heads.

Tell us that tomorrow
will be another day.
But now, for sure, the writing
we should put away.

Lock up our computers,
hide our ball point pens.
Throw away our pencils
in the garbage bins.

Please try to divert us
and help us to forget
so there will be no errant
verses to regret.

When we wake tomorrow,
we’ll hold our heads up high
with no embarrassing poetry,
no need to wonder why.

We posted here such drivel
that it could make one weep.
We just kept on writing.
We should have been asleep.

We did it for NaPoWriMo
against out better sense.
The late hour made us silly.
Tequila made us dense.

Tomorrow we’ll make up for it––
put bees within our bonnet
and write an ode, a ballad,
A haiku or a sonnet

Once more you’ll dare to call us friend
and read our royal rhyme.
I don’t know why I’m calling me
“We” all of this time.

I really don’t feel royal
my identity’s not split.
I simply started writing
and “we” just seemed to fit.

I can’t seem to finish
this awful little rhyme.
So I’m just going to have to
Stop and holler TIME!!!