the lady upstairs has been taking a shower for five hours

by nick nelson

i could describe the good old days with precision and with charm but i have a problem nobody gives a good gosh darn i don’t know why they should the world has spun many times gods and peasants come and go no one remembers their crimes or remembers their heroic deeds or if they ever existed i didn’t want to write this poem but you insisted what was that? i must have misunderstood then i leave you with this thought - people are bad, they should be good outside the sun is shining but some think it might rain tomorrow is another day shall we meet again?

a prophet

by wiggly jones, "the little hippie boy"

if nobody likes you there is not much you can do except sit in your room and feel blue you can plot to destroy the world or bring a message of eternal love the universe laughs behind you waiting to give you a shove my time was up a long time ago now i sit on the sidewalk and watch the gutter flow i used to see lots of cigarette butts sometimes cigar butts too but the world is always changing i know that this is true someday humans will disappear and the dinosaurs return in the meantime, my dear friend we can but live and learn

ask for mr black and tell him you are feeling blue

johnny had a number he kept it in his head he decided to play it every day until he was rich or dead danny stood on the corner and took down johnny’s number with a philosophy of life danny was not encumbered johnny had a number and danny took it down eddie wore a hat of straw and was a man about town florence wore a girdle to keep her tummy flat edna sat in the window and did not approve of that harry drove a taxicab in order to pay the rent joe remembered doris and wondered where she went sometimes i sit in the darkness and ponder what to think but my pencil has no lead and my printer has no ink

joe

time is a dog named joe and i am a ball in joe’s mouth he is running away out of the park and down the street i shout come back, joe but he doesn’t come back he runs across the street into the traffic and gets hit by a bus he always was a bad dog

because

by wiggly jones, "the little hippie boy"

a dog runs down the street because the world is big a cat sits in a window because the universe is expanding rain falls on an empty house beside a road outside gadsden alabama because it just does a legal secretary looks at a slip of paper without really seeing what is on it because she has an immortal soul a child In juneau alaska slowly peels the paper and then the tinfoil off a chocolate bar and then drops it in the dirt because hidden by a cloud a flaming eye is watching it

born

from the day you are born they hand down the rules you want to pick flowers they make you go to school you want to run naked but they make you wear clothes you want to make love and they punch you in the nose your dog spot was your friend now he sits home alone they fill your head with numbers until your brain turns to stone from the jail of school to the prison of work the media follows with its menacing murk you want to wade in the water and watch the waves roll but they deep fry your dreams and slowly slice your soul

a cloudy day

have you ever risen from the dead looked around and scratched your head said, this world can not be saved and crawled right back into the grave? have you ever wondered why no meteors flash across the sky to announce your passing by? i know you have - because so have i what would this world be without you? without me? in a very sorry state left to its own fate why do you all hate me? and fail to appreciate me? lies rule the earth and the truth is hid is it something that i did?