You missed the party?

Friday was my birthday, in case you missed it. Which one? You'll have to go back and ask Roman.

Birthday candles that brightened the day:

**A hit and run hug from a cute blond.

**Lunch with Bestest Daughter at a fascinating little bistro.

**An impromptu rendition of Happy Birthday from the lady at the next table.

**All day long, congratulatory texts messages, including one from an unknown number.

**A mini party with Mom at The Place on the Hill. Luvly brought chocolate cupcakes.

**Mom getting either bored or antsy and rolling off to her room. Did Mom dis my party?

**A Saturday night celebration at my favorite restaurant with a number for a name. Us four and two more (Bestest Daughter and Bestest Son each brought a friend.) Bread was devoured, food was consumed, but wine alas, was only sipped.

**Birthday package from Yooper Sis including dark chocolate and sufficient endowment for a good brandy. With instructions to use it for such. I do believe I have corrupted her.

**Oh yes, and new lights for outside the garage, which Luvly suggested I might want to install for my birthday. Indeed.

Was it worth turning xx? What, you still haven't figured it out?

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Roman sez...

"Here lies in the eternity of the past, from whence there is no resurrection for the days—whatever there may be for the dust—the forty-ninth year of a well-spent life, which, after a lingering disease of many months sank into lethargy, and expired, March 27, 2009, A.D. leaving a successor inconsolable for the very loss which occasioned its existence." Adapted from Lord Byron

Roman sez…

Random Kid: You look older.
Cantankerous Old Goat: It must be something I VIII.
RK: So what are you looking IV?
COG: The last V decades.
RK: Will you find where they went II?
COG: The odds are M to I.
RK: So where are you going II?
COG: I’m going to L.

If you know 'where' Cantankerous Old Goat went, leave appropriate comments. Chocolate cake with double fudge frosting to the clever.

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The Rhythm's Gone

You remember the villanelle, don't you? Ok, me neither. But what I wanted to write last night didn't fit anything else, so I shoe-horned it into this form.

And yes Mikki, I cheated on the rhymes. Is that an F?


The Rhythm's Gone

The singer left the stage and took his song
His last note disappeared into the night
The drums were put away, the rhythm's gone

They dragged off all the gear and moved along
Their moment came and went beneath the light
The singer left the stage and took his song.

The one who heard the music settles down
And turns his ear to its own silent plight
The drums were put away, the rhythm's gone

But rhythm that's unheard is really gone
To where a song can soar in unseen flight
The singer left the stage and took his song.

The soul who felt the music as its own
Still hears the rhythm deep inside despite
The drums are put away, the rhythm's gone

The singer leaves, but doesn't take his song
And yet to those who don't see unseen light
The singer left the stage and took his song
The drums are put away, the rhythm's gone

This post was inspired by my mood after an evening of listening to two endlessly creative musicians, who play and sing waaaay better than I write poetry.

Sunday Sun Day

"Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life." Pablo Picasso

Sunday was one of those rare March days on the North Coast, where it stopped rainsnowsleetslushing long enough for Luvly to declare that she will certainly be depressed if it snows again this spring. Yeah, sometimes the winter grime gets in your soul, too.

Sixty, I tell you, sixty degrees was topped on the little dial outside my window that oddly enough seems to tell me how happy to be with the weather. And...And! The sun showed its face like an embarassed truant, sneaking in and out, hoping to seem like it had been there all along.

So with the sun clearing the cobwebs out of my brain, I did what any spring-loopy guy would do on a Sunday afternoon. No, not golf. I washed my truck.

Bucket, hose, sponge, chamois, paper towels, one neighbor waving jealously(?) pityingly(?) and the truck looked much better. Nothing like a hand wash to get rid of the grime.

A few hours later as I'm writing, in the background I hear Jim Cullum's Jazz Band, heavy on the clarinet and sax tonight. The music filters through my brain and my soul, taking along the tension, the edginess, the unrest, and leaving me at ease with the world. At least for tonight.

Yeah, the grime does get in your soul, but oh my, how music can wash it away.

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Inspector Bleunohs Visits

Inspector Bleunohs: (doffs his fedora) Excuse me my good fellow, but we haven’t seen Mr. Sezmark for a week. You were identified as a former associate. Do you have any clues as to his whereabouts?

Mr. Sezmonkey: (scratches) Harumph! Former associate. And nobody says whereabouts anymore.

Inspector Bleunohs: (sniffs in annoyance) Well we certainly don't say harumph anymore either. We found bits of chewed up paper next to your cage. Why is that?

Mr. Sezmonkey: (scratches) He fired me, so I ate him. Kinda chewy. Did not taste like chicken.

Inspector Bleunohs: (knits brow sternly) You bloody well can’t eat someone for firing you.

Mr. Sezmonkey: (scratches) He dissed me for eating bananas. Plus he fired me.

Inspector Bleunohs: (slumps resignedly) Oh dear. I do suppose I must tranquilize you now. Bend over.

Mr. Sezmonkey: (scratches) That’s not a syringe. That’s a baseball bat.

Inspector Bleunohs: (smirks) But I do believe it will tranquilize you. And quite dissuade you from dining on dissenters.

Mr. Sezmonkey: (scratches) Awright awright, don’t get your knickers in a knot. I didn’t eat him. Geez, you think I’m an animal or something? I just ate all his ideas. He went to look for new ones.

Inspector Bleunohs: (jaw drops) New ideas? What a jolly good notion. I quite hope he finds a lorry load.

Mr. Sezmonkey: (scratches) Don't get your hopes up.

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I Failed at Mediocre

The assigned title was "Mediocrity and How I Achieved It." I failed at mediocre. I did terrible really badly.


Medocirity and how me acheives it.

My Daddy was all the time tells me like this, "Son, if a somethings what your gonna to do, if’n its not worth doing at all, then I’m for certin it ain’t worth doing right in the first place." Always he wood tells me stuff like that. Sooner than youda thunk, just it soaked in, and I beleeved it to.

So me, I sets about to make a reel something of me, cuz I thinking he prolly is right. I done did my darnedest to not ever to do nothing what might not be worth not doing at all, at least not right. So you no, I got just purty good at it, this not doing nothing ain’t worth not doing right.

All of it, it worked out awright, pretty much so, till I goes and got a job from this guy. He was be a farmer who owns a farm and always he goes and tell me to do stuff. So but when I looked at things, you know, what he want me doing. I thinks always of that my daddy sed to me. I think then, this is not worht not doin rite, so’s Im thinkin not to do it in the start.

But this guy, this farmer who owned a farm, hes not like my dady when it’s come to thinking about how to do and not to do work what it mite not just be worth not doing.

He says I’m the most medeocirest person he nose. So he fired me.

I thinks Dady wuld be prowd.
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Monkey sez...

Monkey sez...

I'M FIRED?!?! You're getting rid of me? I can't believe you'd do that. Without a word too. One day I'm happily greeting all your visitors, the next day I'm gone. Fired. Axed. Downsized. Dumped. Unassigned. Disappropriated.

Mark sez...

I'm sorry. Times are tough in the blogging business. I had to cut costs. I really couldn't afford you anymore. You know how much it costs every day just to have the ASPCA monitor this site? Then there's your health insurance. And bananas.

Monkey sez...

I. Eat. Bananas. And you can't afford me. It's not the bananas. What is it really?

Mark sez...

~sigh~ No it's not. It's just that people thought you were writing the blog. I can't have that. It's embarrassing.

Monkey sez...

So you found some scrap metal and spray paint in your garage, and painted me out of the picture. That's cold.

Mark sez...

You're a monkey, get a job at the zoo. Or Congress. Or as a spokes-monkey, like that spokes-gecko.

Monkey sez...

Hey my cousin runs one of those money-sucking banks. I could be the Money Monkey.

Mark sez...

But not a comedian. Oh, I found a buyer for your crib.

Monkey sez...

You're selling my cage? You know what, you're fired as my blog host. Maybe I'll start my own.

Any monkeys displaced in the re-organization of this blog have been offered other suitable positions. No money-sucking banks have responded to this post.