Hate Couture — The Keffiyah

Emanuel Roth

Hate Couture is all the homicidal RAGE,
With Keffiyahs on their heads, and weed stinking in their jaws,
It's Jihad these useful idiots help wage.

Symbol of bigotry, symbol of genocide and symbol of hatred,
Worn by peace militants and celebrities alike,
But don't point out their hypocrisy, killing Jews is sacred.

They say it's just a scarf like any other,
So chic, so modern, all the cool aid drinkers wear it.
Who do they think they're fooling, why do they even bother?

Offering more BANG for the buck than any other hate symbol could.
A symbol ounce for ounce more genocidal than a Che t-shirt,
A scarf that incites the zealots more than even a KKK hood.

Spurred on by an unholy mix of ignorance and ideology,
Liberals dancing to the beat of Islamic fascism.
And if you've seen a liberal protest, you know I'm not talking allegorically.

(Thanks to Michelle Malkin for the term "hate couture".)

Harvey Korman was a lot of fun.

when angels look at earth to see
what they can do for you and me
i'm sure they often wonder why
we wait so long before we die
preferring to remain in misery

but now that harvey's there to tell
the jokes they even love in hell
the angels may begin to guess
that laughter makes the pain hurt less
as even they will fall beneath his spell

(sub)urban poet

FRANWATSON

where can i find art?
in my heart, a sky, a leaf,
through fresh opened eyes.

Urban Poet

how can i find art through opened eyes
when i sleep away the daylight hours
once a defense against city cries
and dark and gloomy city towers

now in the suburbs i look for what
the concrete canyons haven't got

sunshine is always uplifting
gray skies sometimes get me down
still i don't know why i would find myself wilting
when even the rain can't make me frown

i should be enjoying the springtime sunny or not
before the deep summer really gets hot

so art is never in the trees
but only in the leaves on which we draw them
never in what he sees
but how the artist leads us toward them

tomorrow i'll go out again
and bring my notebook and my pen

up all night

up all night again
for the second time this week
i nap like a cat

in this quiet town
there are no advantages
in sleeplessness

where can i find art
outside of the museums?
i am still looking

motors

FRANWATSON

Even in the ancient dark of night,
they hum, or twitter, or throb,
boom and roar and growl unbidden
to sustain the civilized world,
(read: keep me warm, fed, entertained).

They mark time with my beating heart
as I go to sleep, singing a motorized lullaby
of wheels and wires, of sparks and plugs,
and comforting assurances. Overhead
“red-eye” flights cross the moon, waning
as they are absorbed into other stars.

Sad to say, in this inky April moment,
the owl who seeks his mate, the peepers
likewise searching, the wind and even rain,
are lost in

humming,

thrumming,

motors.

Urban Poet

seeking the silence
I walk in the quiet woods
along the highway

window fan whirring
my refrigerator groans
I lie sleeplessly

the machines whisper
songs of noisy diligence
disturbing the peace

too late to negotiate

wrap a schmatte round your head
scream you want to see me dead
peace is just a process, not
something we should think we've got
never happen, when a war
is what our "partners" all adore
fighting biting kicking scratching
the violence they've got is catching

Winter Creek

FRANWATSON

Roaring down the crevice
from the hilltop to the sea,
by way of several rivers,
my creek speeds to be free
turned into a dervish
of roiling winter rain,
it rises in an instant
over banks that can’t contain.

Thunder boomed the warning,
much too quick to heed,
scouring torrents rumbled
through rocks and soil and weeds.
Then just as fast, it quiets,
resumes its placid mask,
murmuring contentedly
through brown December grass.

Urban Poet

Ah, it was in the bleak December
that a storm came I remember
that flooded both our basement and our lawn.

The weather forecast guessed
that it might be for the best
if we headed for the hills before the dawn.

As we left the sodden town
we watched helpless chickens drown
as the neighbor's barnyard bubbled, and was gone.

Now the drought is really over
and the meadows are in clover,
but my neighbor's face is still so pale and drawn.

Baby

Nibble the baby's fingers and toes,
kiss the baby's little nose,
your love for baby really shows --
now chase him down -- there he goes!

Running around, so proud he's grown,
what's he done now? the parents moan.
That's all in the future, so they say.
Treasure your sleeping baby today.

Someone's got to get the credit!
Let the kids take all the blame.
Once you've raised them, you can't edit
what they do in search of fame.

Some day someone's sure to ask,
Weren't they a fearsome task?
Go ahead and let them know:
It was fun! Why, doesn't it show?

Katzenjammer

FRANWATSON

What cats won’t do.

Cats won’t beg woefully
to be loved. They will, though,
demand affection at a time and place
of their choosing, signalled by purring
as they crouch to attack a lap
or pillow upon which you sleep.

Cats won’t heel upon command,
nor endure a pet container.
They will chase a moving toy
until bored, batting it casually away
beyond human reach to age
in some dusty grave, along with mice
once the object of unflagging interest,
pursued with the ardor of a lover,
when dead, discarded and disdained.
must be a trove of tired toy
sand mice, decaying and graying,
that humans smell, but never find.

Cats will seemingly starve rather
than eat food that doesn’t appeal,
a new diet, or an old one
suddenly not favored. They will however,
eat a parlor palm down to the trunk.
Owners of white cats are unable to wear black
and black cats quickly show the folly of white.
Great balls of fur drift from them,
signs, no doubt, of their august presence.
All of that being said,
My reincarnation will be
as a house cat, spoiled and petted,
---when I choose.

"There are many intelligent species in the universe.
They are all owned by cats." --Anonymous

Urban Poet

Felines squalling,
tomcats calling
in the summer, in the dark,
in the alleys, in the park,
in my head
as I lie awake in bed.

Telling all their ancient stories
of their travels and their forays
out of Egypt in the past,
arriving in my home at last.

I will serve them without pause,
since I love them, just because.

The Anthropologist's Creed

FRANWATSON

LESSONS

Lucy, Snoopy and Charlie Brown:
Psychology one-oh-one.
Life is better based on them,
Simply, softly done.

Lessons we all understand,
Picking up the shards
Of dignity, survival ,
Learned in friends’ back yards.

Hope and trust in footballs
Forever snatched away,
Believing as we lay in pain
We’ll get that ball one day.

Love (like Linus’ blanket)
Dreams (like Snoopy’s flights)
Faith (in the Great Pumpkin) ,
And individual rights.

Pigpen’s right to dust clouds,
Charlie’s innocence,
Lucy’s nasty meaness,
And devious intents.

Schroeder’s right to genius
Though others don’t agree,
The world without grown people
Sounds pretty good to me.

Lucy, Snoopy and Charlie Brown,
Please, never disappear.
Your truths become more precious
With every passing year.

Urban Poet

You're a good man, Charlie Brown
and I hate to get you down
but that Lucy's angry frown
is a sign she's up to trouble.

She treats you like a clown
but remember wisdom's crown:
that the sensible fish swims down,
and you'll never burst her bubble.

Ah, well, such is your renown
all around our little town,
if your sorrrow you would drown --
just give it to her double!

I love mankind;
it's people I can't stand. -- Linus

Afghan Agonistes

FRANWATSON

signs of wealth somewhere:

more wives than teeth, both blessing and curse,
a rusty car, suffering now from sand that blows
night and day, scouring away the paint,
and destroying the cogs and tubes inside
rugs. on the bare earthen floors,
on walls,on couches and beds, covering the chairs,
forming warm windows where none can be
for fear of midnight or daylight attacks.opium,
by pounds and ounces waiting
for deep-pocketed men to thrust more wealth
into my luxurious life. Surely guns,
to fill with noise
the empty desert air when I can no longer stand
the women and the wind, they bark out power!
declaring all that I am not.

Urban Poet

harshly as Kipling described
the virtues of the Afghan race
his descriptions belied
that virtue of which remains no trace

only anger and violence meeting
in the all encompassed feud
in a free translation of their ancient greeting:
we just don't like ya, dude!

cellphones on the bus

i never saw such battery life
the bus is rife with their squawks at night

they yak
they yakety yak
they yak & they yak
they yak yak yak yak yak yak yak

come on people cut me some slack
i like to nap on the bus trip back