Stone Soup Croutons, 8-29-19, Trump in Mar-a-Lago

Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions picked up from poems overheard from Stone Soup's open mic readers and features. I figure out a title (and sometimes the rest of the poem) later. You can read the other ones I've done since 2015 here. To paraphrase Lorne Michaels, this poem doesn't go up because it's ready, it goes up because it's Friday morning.

Last night was the last open mic in St. Paul's with feature Ryan "Ratt" Travis. Starting September 11, we move to our new location at the Assemblage Gallery. I will miss the Thursday night routine a little, but I won't miss having to bang out a Trump poem on a Friday monring after a week's worth of exhaustion.

Based on my last two poems over the last two weeks, I wanted to do a trinity of Trump based poems. Is that too manipulative of what should be an organic process? Maybe. But seeing this news piece before the open mic started made me want to try. Special nod to Gawaine Ross for reciting this Gregory Corso poem. It helped me get to the end.

All in all,, a nice way to close out an era. Just the other day, my girlfriend asked me, "Is one year really an era?" In poetry, I'd say yes. Just ask me about the month long Yarrow era at Out of The Blue sometime. Thanks for reading.


Trump in Mar-a-Lago

He prays Avril Lavigne lyrics
in place of scripture.
Let his head be enough
to keep land above water.

He calls on Saint Pilates.
Keep him limber enough
to carry one more thing
while DC stays submerged.

He sings a battle hymn.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah...
replacing part about truth
with a country music chorus.

Not wanting to be a fool,
he negotiates with God.
Will he start being good?
Begin being faithful?

Will he forsake 80's treasures
if they are not washed up?
Forsake his knees, deny
more bouncing bounties?

Just stop this slow burn
in water, starting slow
like a Shatner ballad
building to shatter.

Keep all the zombies
underneath his green
from dragging skeletons
around a Twitter trend.

He wishes he burned
what he instead buried,
loving explosions, hating
consequence of fire.
 

And that's a wrap.

Special thanks to Julia Vogel, Jan Rowe, Gawaine Ross, Erik Nelson, Martha Boss, Laurel Lambert, Krystal, Holly, Bil Lewis and James Van Looy.