Comparing Craziness

When you’re down in the dumps

And life’s giving you lumps,

It’s so nice to have lunch with a friend;

For occasional slumps,

Like a log’s many bumps,

Make it hard with a smile to pretend

 

All is dandy and fine.

Sometimes problems combine

With the natural ways that you cope

And your pal throws a line,

Which you take as a sign

That you’re not at the end of your rope.

 

So you sit and you eat,

Which itself is a treat,

And compare what’s been driving you nuts.

Though you do not compete,

Each admits to defeat

By not climbing up out of your ruts.

 

Still, a heaviness lifts,

One of friendship’s best gifts,

(Which can also take place on the phone).

Though the stuff that resists

Cheering up still exists,

You, at least, feel a lot less alone.

In Neutral

The days drift by at summer’s pace,

Too insubstantial to embrace.

Without a goal that I can chase,

In neutral I am stuck.

 

Though I am home, most any place

Would seem the same, with just a trace

Of novelty to help me face

A way out of the muck.

 

No matter what, in any case,

The passing time might grant some grace,

My lethargy conceding space

To welcome back some pluck.

On Centre Court

At Wimbledon, on Centre Court,

The players, dressed in white,

Run back and forth across the grass,

To spectators’ delight.

 

Of course, in the United States,

The court called Arthur Ashe,

In honor of a tennis great,

Is where opponents clash.

 

If it did not have Ashe’s name,

It might be Center Court,

But note the “e” and “r” reversed,

Which U.S. guides support.

 

The U.S. Open doesn’t mind

What color players wear,

Unlike Britain’s rules of “colour”

With a “u” that’s stuck in there.

 

I realize (yes, I use a “z,”

Not “s,” as do the Brits)

That language often changes after

Factions call it quits.

 

It’s fascinating, really,

How our long-ago “divorce”

Somehow took the centre of the land

And moved it off its course.

Sprawled

Whenever I see someone

Sprawled on a bench,

Exposed to the elements,

Hands in a clench,

 

I wonder if long ago,

Curled in his crib

Or perched in his high chair,

With drips on his bib,

 

A mom or a dad,

With the tenderest gaze,

Saw their hopes for their son

Mapped in various ways.

 

They certainly never

Imagined him stuck

On a bench in a city park,

Down on his luck.

 

Few passersby stop,

(And yes, that includes me)

Rarely thinking about

How such things come to be.

In the U.S. of A.

On this date, in the U.S. of A.

People celebrate in their own way.

There are hot dogs on grills

And the fireworks’ thrills

With the stars and stripes out on display.

 

Yet for many who feel as I do,

There’s no point to this hullabaloo,

For instead of delight

At the flag’s red and white,

All I see and I feel is the blue.

The Wedding You've Heard Of

I didn’t get married at Madison Square

And only immediate family was there.

We needed no permits nor one single guard,

For our wedding was held in my parents’ back yard.

 

There wasn’t a limo to ferry each guest

And a cousin took photographs at our request.

The food was whatever my mother did choose

And no, it did not make it into the news.

 

It’s been fifty years, though, so, begging your pardon,

The wedding you’ve heard of today, at the Garden,

May have all the world and the paparazzi

Pay attention, but what is important to me

 

Is that keeping it simple worked fine way back when

And if I had to do it all over again,

There’s just one little change I’d be certain to make –

Not a holiday weekend, a common mistake.

Early July

It’s early July and what’s happening is

The weather’s so hot it will make your hair frizz

And perhaps even ruin that cold champagne fizz

At Taylor and Kelce’s “I do’s.”

 

Abe Lincoln sits gazing at water, now green,

With algae the worst anybody had seen

And you-know-who claiming his conscience is clean –

It’s vandals that one should accuse.

 

The National Mall has a Giant State Fair

But somehow the crowds aren’t showing up there.

Performers pulled out, for they’d rather be where

They’re not forced to air you-know-who’s views.

 

Though the temps may be broiling, an obvious fact,

And the wedding at Madison Square will distract,

The sad truth is the soon-to-be 4^th has been stacked

With so much that it’s hard to enthuse.

 

For our country’s divided on every stage,

Which will make it a challenge for us to engage

And beneath all the fireworks, sorrow and rage

Will infuse all the red, white, and blues.