Parodies

Take a left on the Boulevard of Broken Reeds, find rhymes for “San Francisco” that you’d never have come up with otherwise, and who knows where you’ll end up?

March 17, 2011

My Shadow

My tiny or big shadow walks around and in or out
And I do not know, and cannot find out, what it is about.
It is similar to my body, from foot right up to hair,
It follows all my jumping, with two hands to match my pair.

And what is truly funny about it is how it will grow,
Not at all as normal kids do, which is always oh so slow.
For my shadow might shoot up tall, as if it’s a bouncing ball
But it also might stay tiny, as if it’s nothing at all.

It hasn’t got a notion of how us kids ought to play
And it only will do foolish things in any sort of way.
It fights back if I punch at it, but it’s not strong or hairy,
It won’t go far away; I think it finds all things too scary.

It was an odd hour of a morning, not past sunup.
I was pouring a bag of dog food out for my small pup.
But my shadow didn’t join this trip, it thought that it was boring.
It has to catch a lot of Z’s; I’m glad that it’s not snoring!

February 28, 2011

Looking for my own

Load the song, sing out each note.
Call it spring but grab your coat.
Nobody so far can know
Who is headed north.

One eye forward, one eye back
They always play, we watch, like that
Spring can have ties, we stay on track
Till summer will return.

Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait to fade.
Are you aware where new teams played?
The pyramids and the parades
Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait to fade.

When at first I learned to read
I used all the words behind me
Them and then and you and three
Still need to find my time.
And how I take my time.

That singer had a voice that shines
Like stolen cash and shoehorned rhymes.
Romanticism can be fine
No season is a mourning time.

Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait to win.
Are you aware the shape we’re in?
The turns we take, the clocks they spin
Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait to win.

Three names that became hard to say
Looking for my own.
What he was then I’m not today
I haven’t changed, but grown.

Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait to sing
For no one knows the shape of spring.
With hands they snag, with bats they swing.
Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait to sing.

Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait a year.
Are you aware what counts as “here”?
Who’s to say who is far or near?
Oh Brooklyn, Brooklyn, wait a year.

I find my voice with time and age.
The present will not be a cage
I won’t have to turn to a stage
Since now we have the game.

Three words that became hard to say
Looking for my own.

January 25, 2011

I Feel The Ice Move

In over three and a half years, I have not blogged solely about my athletic…exploits they’re not…until now. There is probably a good reason for that.

I feel the ice move under my feet.
I see players tumbling down.
I feel myself start teetering
And then I hit the ground.

The other team is a disgrace.
They should mellow out and play.
We will not stay shorthanded
If the game goes on this way.

I wish we all had goalie
Pads to help us get through the game.
I know my sliding motions
Are something I just can’t tame.
But I stand right back up.

I gotta keep control
Down to the distant goal
It’s cold but I sweat all over.

January 15, 2011

From Julia de Burgos

This project was based on a prompt from a weekly set posted on another site. I don’t think I’ll do all of them but this one struck my fancy.

The instructions were to:

Choose a favorite poem written by somebody else, type a copy of it, delete every other line from the poem, and write your own lines to replace those you’ve deleted. Next, delete the remaining lines from the old poem so that only your lines remain. Read what you have, and revise it, adding new lines to fill in the gaps.

For an added twist, the original poem “A Julia de Burgos” was in Spanish–I’d read it before and I wanted to practice the language. A lot of the stanzas were “you are this/but I am that”, so I deleted the “I am that” line and wrote new ones to go with it. So the end result was “I am x/I am y/I am z/I am something else…” which meant I didn’t need to fill a whole lot in.

That we are doomed to battle and you will win out over me
Is too nonsensical to be a lie.
No field could tilt so far to field such a battle.
I would strip naked to rid myself of you.

I am the warm truth that slices through each scene.
I am the frigid water from an unforgiving lake.
I am like the universe, I see myself in no direction.
I am the singing girl in a thousand harmonies.
I am in my work, I am in each day.

The earth caresses me, the water saves me.
You are turning and bowing, slithering and slanting,
I slowly step forward, one day at a time.

You cannot be trusted to your own device
Pushing you towards the dazzling things;
Broken glass, broken promises, rushing poison.
I am pushed by something beyond me,
The more harrowing of the bosses, in the end.

You owe the honeybees that swoop to your lineage.
You are the zero we cannot but skirt around.
Between you and me we hold humankind.

And all of humankind converges in the limit,
Returning to the water that they cannot escape
They begin to rise as one.
And though it takes all the time in the world,
There will be more of me than what has burned away.

January 8, 2011

Ring Out, Wild Chords

Ring out, wild chords, to your wild sky
With flying clouds and frosty light
2010’s fading out by night.
Ring out, wild chords, and watch it fly.

Ring out what’s old, ring in what’s young.
Ring, happy chords, out through crisp snow.
2010’s going, watch it go.
Ring out truth till it’s loud and sung.

Ring out crying that saps a mind
For all passing through that last door.
Ring out spats among rich and poor,
Ring in goodwill to all mankind.

Ring out clamor of barking jaws
And old forms of party striving.
Ring in ways that bring, now arriving,
Nobility and upright laws.

Ring out all want and toil and sin
Chill without faith, surrounding wrong;
Ring out, ring out, thy mournful song
But ring a full, broad music in.

Ring out dumb boasts of land or blood
Civic boasting and claims to fight;
Ring in passion for truth and right,
Ring in common passion for good.

Ring out what’s foul, what will annoy
Ring out a narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out a thousand wars of old,
Ring in a thousand months of joy.

Ring in your night, ring in our day
Ring in valiant minds and hands;
Ring out dark shadows on our lands
And ring in Christ upon his way.

December 6, 2010

Carrion Comfort

Not, I’ll not, carrion comfort, giving up, not claim you;
Not untwist, slack as it is, this last strand of man
Within my mind, or cry I cannot go on. I can;
Can…what? Wish it was day. Or not stop living, too.
But ah, but O thou monstrous, why would you hurtfully do
All this–wring out my right foot? attack with a lionlimb? scan
With a malicious look my bruising body? and fan,
O in turns of whirlwind, my form frantic just to avoid you or fight through.
Why? That my chaff might fly, my grain stand, straight and bright.
Nay in all that toil, that coil, for (right?) I kiss a rod,
No, a hand, I wasn’t strong, looking for joy, caught sight
Sight of whom? That champion by whom I was flung–his foot trod
On holy ground–or his rival? O who? Is it both? That month, that night
Of dark that’s past now I worm lay struggling with (my God!) my God.

November 29, 2010

An Art

Skill at losing is no difficult art.
So much stuff is trying to say you should
Lack it, that with it it’s not hard to part.

Try losing day and night. Know you will dart
For hours, looking for small bits of wood.
Skill at losing is no difficult art.

Now work on losing much: a car, a cart,
Locations,  family, what was a good
Spot to go to. Stay within your small part.

I lost my mom’s watch. And look! Now I start
Losing a block, a suburb, or my ‘hood.
Skill at losing is no difficult art.

I lost a city, glorious. It won’t smart
That I lost four brooks, this land, all I could
Look at. I miss it, but I claim this part.

And losing you (a joking sound, a fart–
Humor) I maintain truth, and so I would
Say losing’s not so difficult an art
Though it may look as if I’ll fall apart.

November 22, 2010

On first Looking into Chapman’s Translation

I visit many distant lands of gold
And find many goodly kingdoms abroad.
Across many islands down south, I’d trod,
Which bards loyal to grand Apollo hold.
Oft of a vast location, I was told,
A high-brow’d historian’s old domain
But hoping to visit it was in vain
Till I saw Chapman talk out loud and bold:
It was as if, watching in a night sky,
I’d found out that an unknown orb had swum
Into sight, or how Balboa did spy
Pacific foam afar–and, all struck dumb
His sailors look’d around, not knowing why–
Upon a hill in Panama, half-numb.

(As in “Bright Star”, this author puts punctuation in highly lucky locations for my parodying! What can I say?)

November 1, 2010

Bats and Balls (Reprise)

Who’s that playing the Rangers?
I’ll tell you who’s that playing the Rangers.
Rookies and a Freak and a Kung Fu Panda and a Beard and a barrel of madcap strangers
Those are who’s playing the Rangers.

What’s in the daily news?
I’ll tell you what’s in the daily news.
Story about game five, Giants hoping to clinch it, Rangers just trying not to lose
That’s what’s in the daily news.

What’s happening all over?
I’ll tell you what’s happening all over.
Fans sitting at home by television sets, wondering if this is when the season will be over.
That’s what’s happening all over.

When you see a bat
Whipping around a hat
You can bet that it’s just looking for a ball…

*

Follow the trend and hit no more,
Hit no more, hit no more.
Put down the baseball bat, use it no more.
Follow, follow the trend.

*

A World Series ring would look grand
On any given pitching hand,
So closers try to bar the door
Making sure the batters don’t score.
When many a rookie’s a star
You’d better give thanks to your scout,
And things being how they are
Hope you can get that final out.
So the Arlington ballpark’s the spot
For both teams to give all that they’ve got.

It was good old reliable Brian
Brian, Brian, Brian Wilson
If you’re looking for action, his mound is the spot
And he’ll serve you up heaters when he gets hot
Yeah it’s good old reliable Brian
Hoping not to issue a walk
And to end the Giants’ established title drought
Since they left New York.

*

I got your batter here, they’re gonna end the year
With him still on the bench, I can see it clear.
Cantu, Cantu, this guy that they’ll have, Cantu.
Won’t get a chance to come through, come through, come through.

His batting skill was clear, I know this will sound queer
But it’ll turn out to be the pitchers’ year.
Cantu, Cantu, it sounds crazy to me too.
But this sort of pace won’t do, won’t do, won’t do.

Now listen here, this Bum? He’s not really a bum
And it’s through him that lots of success will come
The kids, the kids, will avert potential skids
And someday attract big bids, big bids, big bids.

And speaking of which. Cliff! His arm will not be stiff
And he’ll keep pitching through hoping for a whiff.
Has chance, has chance, with him they still have a chance
You’ll see how far they’ll advance, advance, advance.

Now just a minute, boys, you make a lot of noise
But we’ll just have to see all the season’s joys.
Who knows, who knows, which way any season goes?
Only after, I suppose, suppose, suppose.

It once seemed so unclear, but now the end is here.
Oh, what a crazy year!

October 3, 2010

Two guys named Sanchez

Without dreams of wins and pride a team will lose
Though they still play games, they can’t hope to go on.
Hot starts lead to playoff dreams, but face the facts;
Until you have clinched, you can’t really relax.
Have a team lose ten in a row. They won’t die
Right away. If they’re chased, they will survive.
Bring on the chance of extra games. They won’t cry.
Tiredness won’t ease the hunger in their minds.

Though they don’t belong to the same family
Teammates strive as one, against calamity.
Trying to hold a lead in the pennant race
The way it was going, they’d need a tight brace.

Give them five-plus shutout innings, they will thrive.
A triple and single keep them alive.
With the season in the balance, they’ll impress
With the winning run, from two guys named Sanchez.

Instrumental!