Fourteen Poems of Fourteen Words,
contributed to 14 Words For Love
—Barbara White
They say, “love the one you’re with.”
But what if I’m with Granny Smith?
Can’t sell me Love™, but keep on trying.
I’m sure someone else is buying.
Ginsburg is better than lingerie.
Congress, in truth, is not always play.
Even today.
Vegetarian Valentine
To South Carolina Senator Thomas Corbin
You call me a lesser cut?
My loin’s too tender for your tasteless butt.
Valentine’s sentiment is but a veneer
To obscure the outrage that we live in fear.
Keats was sweet on unheard music.
If only he’d lived long enough to sing.
[Keats’s Grave. Photo By Giovanni Dall’Orto, via Wikimedia Commons.]
We’ll be ashes before long.
Shall we gasp the Valentine song?
Is that wrong?
If it’s not love, it need not—can’t— do.
Gamergate, Rodger, Rice. And you?
“My Funny Valentine”:
Chromatic inner line.
I’d walk miles to hear that muted trumpet.
[“Miles Davis by Palumbo” by Tom Palumbo from New York City, USA. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.]
“My man don’t love me;
Treats me awful mean.”
[Repeat first line on subdominant.]
Number’s Up
Fourteen, and fourteen.
Fourteen more.
Spent am I.
Time to stop, sleep, and snore.