Member Poem

Best Ten Poems from April Poetry Madness

I wrote 269 poems this month, and 865 for the year to date. A record for me.

Only appropriate to include the first and last poems – both about my love-hate affair with my computer

Index

Every Day I Turn on My Computer Warming Up Writing Digest
Dear Microsoft
Evening Delights
Window of Love
Good-Bye
Howling at the Pink Super Moon in honor of the Pink Super Moon
Unanswered Questions
Bad Teeth Poem
American Dreams -Published in Your One Phone Call
Ode to Berkeley, Writer’s Digest Write a City Poem Prompt
 
they are available on my web page, Https://theworldaccordingtocosmos.com and as a podcast on Spotify under the same name.
Every Day I Turn on My Computer Warming Up Writing Digest

For today’s prompt, write a warm-up poem. The warm-up could be related to sports, like warming up before a baseball game or track race. Or it could be about a computer warming up, the weather warming up, or even a relationship warming up. I hope everyone is warmed up for some major poeming in April,

Every Day I Turn on My Computer Warming Up Writing Digest

Every day I turn
On my computer
And pray
That everything will work right

Usually, I encounter numerous errors
Non-response errors
Spinning blue balls
Computer thinking
How can I mess
With my master head errors

Refusing
To open documents
Mysterious haiku-like error messages
That makes sense only to computer geeks
From the planet Mars

Saying the file is open
And blocked for use
By the administrator

But I am the
Damn administrator!
And I did not block the document

Or can’t open the document
Due to a dialogue box

Close the dialogue box
To proceed
But there is no doubt
It is all a plot
Designed to drive me
Quite mad

So sad
So bad
Want to shoot my computer
Put it out of its mystery

Joining the other five dead
Computers in my house

Am I a computer serial killer?
Perhaps that is why
Do they refuse to work for me?
Are they afraid of me?

Sometimes they say
They can’t find the document
Which just kicked me out of
Five minutes ago

Or the computer says
It can’t save a document
With the name of an open document

But just saved the open document
Under the same name
Five minutes ago

Usually
After half an hour
These errors recede

But I often have to reboot
The computer
Giving it the old kick up the head
Of a stubborn mule treatment
Before it gets to the point
And gets to work

To give Microsoft some credit
These errors are less frequent

Down to 40% of the time
When I first open a document
Down from 90% error rates
Success in a way

I complained to Microsoft
Sent them a nice frown message
But I would be shocked
If they ever respond

Just not something
That they would do
Part of their “superior”
Listen to their customer
Friendly service
No doubt

 
Dear Microsoft

Took me ten tries to open this document
And send it to you

Yesterday you achieved
An almost impossible feat
In 30 minutes
During 8 attempts
To unsuccessfully open word
I encountered errors each time
I attempted to open word
I was opening the documents
Using viewfinder
Each time viewfinder attempted
To open the document
Only to kick me out
I had to try an average of ten times
Before it would open a stable view
The worst was when
It took me 28 tries
Then when I opened word
I encountered non-response errors
Usually, five to ten
Waiting for an average of one to two minutes
Before word would respond
Before I could type a word or two
And when I did manage
That simple task
The screen froze
Finally, after spending 30 minutes
And writing five words
I rebooted my computer
And finally got
A stable connection
Congratulations Microsoft
For achieving a 100 percent
Error rate
Way to go!

Note: sent to Microsoft.  I will be shocked if they respond! I Will update this if they do so,

Evening Delights

My favorite time of day
Is early evening
Cocktail hour
When I sit down
To dinner
With my lovely wife
The love of my life
Either at home
Or at a restaurant
After our evening walk
As we eat dinner
We salute the end
Of the day
With a glass of wine
Or a cocktail
Or Soju
As the day fades
Into an evening
Filled with Love
 
Window of Love

Every morning
I step outside
Do my morning thing
While my wife
The love of my life
Sleeps peacefully

I look through the window
From the balcony herb garden
And watch her sleeping

My heart filling with love
As she sleeps away
The early morning

When she wakes up
She fills me
With the sunshine
Of her love

Driving my blues
Away
With the dawning sun

 
Good-Bye

To all those who
have passed on
to another,
hopefully better world
I say goodbye

So many people
Have died this year
From COVID

From Gun violence
From the aging
Of the baby boomer generation

Many musicians
Actors and writers
Have played their last songs
And we will remember them all

Walter Mondale VP, Ambassador, Good guy
Prince Philip ultimate husband
DMX great rapper
George Segal great actor
Vernon Jordan ultimate power player
Norman Jester the phantom tollbooth is closed
Lawrence Ferlinghetti one of my favorite writers
Chick Corea one of my favorite musicians
Mary Wilson just supreme
George Schultz my big boss
Christopher Plummer the Actor
Larry King final interview
Hank Arron greatest baseball player ever

And so many others
I Will soon joins them
As the coronavirus marches on
and guns continue to kill thousands 

I am 65 years old
And as I get older
I have had to say goodbye
To so many people

I am losing count
But I will miss them all
They live on in my memories

My father died in 1985
My mother in 2005
My sister in 2007

My friends have also passed on

My HS debate friend
Demel T died from AIDS

I lost my college roommate
Jon W

David C my Peace course
language student

I lost my visa line colleague
Paul S

I lost my second and third boss
In the foreign service
Julian in a terrorist bombing

Ted H who I worked with twice
Dead of a heart attack
Chris my boss in Bangkok
Also dead from a heart attack

Judy my artistic friend
From Bombay days

And so many others
Have gone on

I only hope wherever they are 
That they are thinking of me
As I think fondly of them

 
In honor of the Pink Super Moon

Howling at the Pink Super Moon

On a moonlit late night
The Pink Supermoon
Casting a baleful light
On the world below

While inside
Sam Adams sat drinking
In a depraved bar
In a den of iniquity

In an evil part of the city
On the left side
Of society

Drinking up a storm
With his buddies
Johnny Walker, Jack Daniels
Jim Beam, and Mr. Evan
And Old Granddad looked on

Encouraging him to drink
One scotch, one bourbon, and one beer

He was just an unhinged lunatic
Dreaming of howling at the full moon

Watching the world walk by
Looking at all the fine-looking babes

Walking by the street
Thinking wild, erotic thoughts
Of endless wild libertine passions

He looked up
At the naked dancing ladies
Dancing up a storm
With an attitude
A Z tude
That could kill

When into the bar
Walked the most beautiful women
In the Universe

So wild, so free
So wonderfully alive

He did not know what to do
As this vision of delight
Sauntered through the bar

In skin-tight leather pants
Looked so fine
That his eyeballs hurt

Finally, he had to say something
he gathered up my manly courage
He walked up to her

She looked at him
Instantly bewitched his soul
With a devilish grin

He lost all reason
And became a raving lunatic
Unhinged lunatic

Under the lunatic light of the full moon
Of the blood-red lights of the moon
Full of wild passions
The lustful beast stirs again

And starts running and running
Howling at the moon
Riding into the new dawn
On a demented Harley Davis cycle
With two naked babes on his back

Riding into the sun
90 miles per second
At the speed of thought
He disappears into the lunatic light
Of the full moon

Sam Adams woke up alone,
In his bed
The naked babes
Having disappeared
From his demented dreams

Saying,

“Man, that was quite a night
I better not go there again”

The wild beast
Laughs
He has heard that before

And joins him
In howling at the Pink moon
In the fading light
Of the lost last night
Of the newly damned

Unanswered Questions

I have so many questions to ask
First how and why I dreamt
Of meeting my wife.
How did she haunt my dreams?
How did she come to life?
What was our past life like?
Why Do I fall in love with her every day?
What does love at first sight mean?
Why did that occur to me three times?
What does hate at first sight mean?
Also, three times in my life,
what does that mean?
What is this thing called love anyway?
Will we meet aliens in my lifetime?
Will I live to see humans on Mars?
Will I live long enough?
to walk on the moon.
When will we develop new body parts?
When can I get new teeth?
Finally, when I die
will there be a heaven or hell?
What will my judgment be?
Finally, will people remember me after I die?

 
Bad Teeth Poem

I was born with bad teeth
Bad eyes
Bad vision
Bad ears
Bad coordination

And almost died
As a young baby
A preemie
Just born too soon

But I had bad teeth
From birth
Got braces
Until I graduated

I hated my teeth
Hated the dentist
But they loved me

Loved my green
I gave them
To fix these evil bad teeth

Over the years
I have spent a lot
Of money
Fixing these bad teeth
Of mine

So many root canals
Lost six teeth
Wear dentures

Still hate my teeth
Still hate
The whole dental torture drill

Hearing in my mind
The Frank Zappa song
The torture never stops

And seeing the sadistic dentist
From Little House of Horrors
Jack Nicolson
In his demented best
Screaming
Pain is Good

Then I get the bill
And the Zappa song
Plays on
The torture never ends

 
American Dreams
Published in Your One Phone Call

You see them
Every morning
Lined outside

Any US Embassy
Around the world

The visa seekers
The American Dream seekers

The poor, the dispossessed
The disenfranchised
The marginalized

The forgotten
The left behinds
Of the not so great society

The rich, the mightily
The powerful
The beautiful

All looking for a slice
Of the American Dream

Some to sample its delicious flavors
Others to try to live
Among its deceptive lures

America beckons
As it has for years and years

Land of the free
Home of the brave
Lady Liberty

The land was a dream
And a little luck
Can make you too
The richest man alive

So, they line up
Outside my office door

Just to talk
To the American Visa God

Spin a tale
Tell a story
Play a game

Pretend to be
What the American Visa God needs

And then you get
Your piece of the American Pie

And off you go
Only to end up

In a thousand neglected
Backwaters of the American nightmare

Flotsam
Floating from one marginal
Illegal job to another

Prey to the predators
Ever behind
The rent demands

For you see
America is a rich habit
It is expensive to maintain

The first taste is free
The rest will cost yah

You live, your soul
And 70 hours per week
At sub-minimum wages

Soon you will be speaking
English
With the poor, the disenfranchised

The flotsam
The neglected
The left behinds

The rich will ignore you
Not know your name

The poor will fear
You will take their jobs away

And your friends back home
I Will wait to hear

About you became a big shot
In the American land

They don't want to hear
No tales of working at McDonald's

Working 70 hours a week
At five jobs per day

No, No, No
That's not America
They see on TV

They want it now
They want their MTV

Where're the babes?
Where are the parties?
Where's the sex with naked ladies

Come on man,
You're holding out

Tell us the tales
Of Wild America

And so, they line up
Every day

Line up outside
My office windows

And we have the power
To set them free

Some to enable them
To dream the American dream

Some to send to the American nightmare
Others to go back home
To wherever they come back

They will be back
They will be back

Nothing will deter them
Not even the lack

Of a piece of paper
From the American Visa God

 
Ode to Berkeley

I grew up in Berkeley
In the late 60s and ’70s
A wild magical time
In a magical city
By the bay

Berkeley was the center
Of my universe
For many years

Until I left it
In my early 20s
To wander about the world

Yet Berkeley never left me
I am still in Berkeley
It lives on in my heart
And soul

And someday
I will return home
To reside

Before I finally leave
Berkeley for good
As I die in my homeland

The End