“More Community Service”

from Part II of The New House of Fame–by Paul “Whitberg” Burgess https://paulwhitberg.wordpress.com/2014/06/24/an-introductory-guide-to-becoming-rich-and-famous-2/

Within your glowing aura, peasants bask

Because you’re loved well by the goddess Cash

And bathed in fluids from Her sacred flask.

You’ll help communities by clearing trash

…For photo ops, before you delegate the task—

And go inside (since heat might cause a rash).]

You’ll grab some garbage, hug a fan, and smile

…for pics, then fuss and stomp away in style.

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“Cinquains”

Before beginning to write goofy poetry a few weeks ago, my other period of writing poetry was in 2006 when I took a Poetry Workshop with one of my favorite professors. The first poems we wrote were cinquains. The cinquain is a five-line, syllabic form with the following pattern:

Line 1: 2 syllables
Line 2: 4 syllables
Line 3: 6 syllables
Line 4: 8 syllables
Line 5: 2 syllables

Before sharing the cinquains, which were the first few poems I ever wrote, I would like to invite you all to compose and share cinquains with me. [I hope to eventually figure out a  graceful way to provide prompts and to receive and display entries; I would welcome any advice regarding how to make the prompt/respond process intuitive and interactive.] Please do not laugh…these were my first poems, and I know that some of them are cheesy!

“Blues”
Blues is
naked music
stripped of all pretension
Until only raw emotion
remains

“Thorn”
Never
the rose without
the prick to remind us
that, though beautiful, love causes
such pain.

“Photo”
Trapped for
eternity
in polished celluloid,
moments call their cage not “jail,” but
“photo.”

“Stoplight”

Stoplight–
red eye dangling
from a smooth black cable,
swaying solemnly in noon’s soft,
sad wind.

“Acne”
Acne
devours beauty,
consumes clear skin;
once sated, digests, excretes a
blemish.

“King Snake”
King Snake,
royal reptile,
though Lion rules jungles,
when grown weary of throne, he can’t
shed skin.

“Red Sand”
For sand:
Crimson-stained land
ever redder becomes
soaked with blood of zealots on a
mission.

“Kiss”
These lips
will serve to bare
my frenzied soul to you–
not with whispered, honeyed words but
a kiss.

“Traffic”
Sweaty
as summer’s sun
has made my skin, its rays
fail to melt the frozen traffic
I’m in.

“Lost and Found”
Do not
Despair that you’ve
Lost so much weight of late;
For I’ve found it and wish to give
It back.

“Casualties”
Seven
and twenty years
we had Morrison and
Hendrix. So quickly burned out our
Bright Jims.

“Dream 1”
Lincoln
And Attila
play chess and smoke cigars
in a realm beyond time and space
and stars.

“Dream 2”
Jesus,
I saw you there
playing and dancing, a
smile on your face and ribbons in
your hair.