The View From My Tiptoes

I stood on my tiptoes to see a bit farther,
To see past the people and over the trees,
And over the forests and past the blue mountains,
And then I looked farther, past stormy gray seas.
And I just kept on looking. I looked past the clouds,
And I looked past the skies and then out past the stars.
I kept looking ahead 'til I couldn't see farther,
I stood on my tiptoes and saw beyond far.
No, I'll never forget what I saw on the day
That I peered past the world and all that it contained.
I saw past forever, past all that we know.
I stared at eternity from my tiptoes.

Mr. White

Mr. White was a blank slate,

A hole in the spectrum,

In his spotless white suit and white shoes and white house

At One-Twenty-Three White Street just off Off-White Lane,

Mr. White lived a life that was crisp, starched and plain.

But behind all that white,

Back behind the white whiteness,

A breathtaking masterpiece hidden from sight.

He felt splashes of colors, bold strokes in bright hues,

He felt greens, he felt yellows, deep reds and sad blues.

Mr. White was a painting,

A rich, colorful canvas,

An intricate portrait no one ever saw.

You see, poor Mr. White, was not white, not really -

Just a canvas, hung backward, his paint to the wall.

Cowboy Ed

There once was a cowboy named Ed,
Whose boots were a bright shade of red ...
Silver guns at the ready
Lasso of spaghetti
In a nine gallon hat
Cowboy Ed proudly sat
On a three-legged pony
Who ate only bologna
Backwards in his saddle
His eyes on the cattle
Yes, Ed drove the herd
Never saying a word
Though he did like to hum
And chew pink bubble gum
As he crisscrossed the plains
Holding tight on the reins
With a wild-eyed stare
And the wind in his hair
Others thought he was weird
Cause he shaved half his beard
And he buttered his chaps
And stopped often for naps
Filled his pockets with snakes
And his pants with corn flakes
Had a squeaky left knee
A bovine allergy
And a canteen of gravy
For his pet cactus Davy ...

Ed was a bit odd, they said.

Lost Thought

Tonight while having a deep think
I tipped my head to sip my drink
And as I did my thought slipped out my ear.

It rolled across the hardwood floor,
Continued right out my back door
And I have lost that thought for good I fear.

It's such a shame, if I may say,
To lose one's well-thunk thought that way.
To have a thought fall right out of your head.

If only I could get it back,
But life's sometimes unfair like that
And so I think I'll just go on to bed.

The Rainmaker

I lean my ladder

Against a dark sky

And I climb to the top

To the heavens, where I

Sit with my pail

On my lofty perch

On a billowy, silver cloud.

I am the rainmaker.

I pour the rain

In drizzles and drops

O'er the hills and the plains.

I spill the raindrops

That sprinkle like tears

On a parched and thirsty world.

Yes, I am the rainmaker.

I wash away

The dust and the grime

And the dirt of the day.

When my bucket is dry,

I climb down again

And I walk through the puddles, home.

The Man in the Desert

I met an old man as I walked through the desert,
As I walked through the desert I met an old man.
In a tired straw hat
And a pair of worn sandals,
That carried him over an ocean of sand.

I said to him "Sir, it's a pleasure to meet you."
"It's a pleasure to meet on this fine sunny day."
But my greeting was met
With a stare and a silence,
He passed me and wordlessly went on his way.

I still travel the trail that cuts through the desert.
I still walk the path that winds through the sand.
I wonder whatever

Became of that stranger,
That stoic, that sun-chapped, that weathered old man.

Three Sisters' Folly

One Tuesday three fortunate sisters,
Found five chests of silver and gold.
But alas, only six short days after,
They had wasted a fortune untold.
And so seven years later the sisters
With just nine pennies left to their name,
Shared a dented tin cup
And a mangy brown pup
And had only themselves to blame.

The Rise and Fall of Nobody

None hundred black knights
From the Castle Nobody
Crossed over the windswept moor,
Heading straight for the Kingdom of No One,
To wage a forgotten war.

No One saw them coming,
No One heard their shouts,
No One was prepared to defend.
The good kingdom fell to the Knights of Nobody,
Yes, No One had come to an end.

Nobody remembers
Just why they attacked
It happened so long ago.
Nobody thrived for none hundred long years
Till the rise of the Kingdom of No.

Roger and Roger and Roger and Wayne

Roger and Roger and Roger and Wayne
Shared Roger's umbrella as they strolled in the rain,
They waved to Wayne's brother in front of the market -
His name was Roger, too.

Starting Over

If I were designing a new me from scratch
I would make a slight change here and there.
For starters I'd give me the eyes of the hawk
And I'd take the great strength of the bear.
Then I'd add on the pouch of the kangaroo
So I'd have a safe place for my keys,
The spots of the leopard, the legs of the frog,
And the bright yellow stripes of the bees.
The ears of the bunny, the elephant's nose
And some beautiful antlers perhaps,
And the shell of the turtle that I could crawl in
For some undisturbed noontime naps.
I'd proudly wear the peacock's tail
The sailfish's majestic sail
And if I got bored
I'd just flap my wings
And gracefully fly away.

The Fly in My Eye

I have a fly
That is caught in my eye
It's the biggest fly I've ever seen

He's hairy and blue
And he's blocking my view
And he's staring at me kind of mean

I've tried pulling and prying

And winking and crying

And jumping on a trampoline

But that fat, stubborn fly

Is stuck fast in my eye

And I can't seem to intervene

The Time Traveler

I am a traveler
Skipping through time,
Sliding through time,
Hurtling through time.
I am a voyager
Racing through time,
The gauge on my wrist
Marks my progress.

I've been to the past -
I was there yesterday.
And if I may say
It was much like today.
I am now in the present,
But I cannot stay,
For I'm pushing onward
To the future.

The Man Growing in My Garden

There's a man growing down in my garden,
He's scattered in pieces and parts.
His head's made entirely of cabbage,
And I think that's a very good start.
His eyes peek from the potatoes,
His ears listen from the corn stalks,
He hasn't a nose
But he has toma-toes
And with time he may learn how to walk.

The New Me

We parted ways with a handshake,
I'll miss me but time marches on.
Yes, I am still here
But it's painfully clear
That the me that I was is long gone.

To Be a Bee With Allergies

To be a bee with allergies,

The endless sounds of buzz... buzz... sneeze.

Hour after loathsome hour,

Toiling within wretched flowers.

Oh, the bitter irony...

To be a bee with allergies.

One Gnu Too Few

I won an old gnu

Which was one gnu too few

One less gnu than I knew I would need.

But I'll try to make due

With this one lonesome gnu

'Til the day I can have two or three.

A Weary Old Crow

A weary old crow came to rest on a clothesline
Stretched between two maple trees in a widow's back yard.
Her unmentionables, a billowy white backdrop,

Gently swaying in the autumn breeze.

Little Shoeless Boy

Little shoeless boy
Throwing stones at the sky,
Only he knows what he's aiming for
And only he knows why.

Low Clearance

Sometimes I wonder
Why earthworms live under
The stones in my flower bed.
I would dislike
A home so small and tight
For I fear I would bump my worm head.

The Beast

It waits for me down in the valleys and gorges,
Within the black shadows it hides and it waits.
It wishes to torment me, lash me and slash me
Gnashing its teeth, longs to seal my fate.
So I stick to the high grounds, the ridges and treelines,
The hills and the mountains where I make my home.
Though sometimes I wonder if I should go down there,
If I should confront the beast that wants my soul.