Bad Poetry, Once Again...

I keep promising not to publish any more bad poetry. But gods and goddesses never honor their promises. So here is some more really good bad poetry for August afternoons:

Fairy Tales

The Sleeping Beauty sleeps.
The thorns have pierced her will.
The Snow-White scrubs the sheets.
Her mind is white and still.
Cinderella sweeps.

Three ravens watch and wait
for the three princes. They are late.

The years pass by; they must.
They eat away the Sleeping Beauty.
The Snow-White turns to rust.
Her mind is starched with duty.
Cinderella's dust.

Three old men totter past.
They are the princes, come at last.

Death, a decisive master,
came and acted faster.

Good, huh? And quite feminist in tone. And the next one is a meditation brought on by the white teeth of Americans!


In this country Sundays
are ironed glaring white.
Prayerbooks and promises
and the searing, searing light.
God, we have dropped by
to tell the deal is on.
But tell us. Tell us why
you shunned your only son.

Never mind. On weekdays
we run the business right.
We climb the human ladder,
we bare our teeth. They're white.
God, you do not understand
the modern world. It's tough.
This land you gave us. This land
has made us hard and rough.