Face it! Humanity’s a deck of cards,
And Life determined by the game it deals.
Consider: Solitaire, War, Hold’em, Hearts,
Blackjack, Gin—all reflect disordered wheels

Of fortune. The rank and colors, jokers,
Rules, define our daily dispositions—
Those broken by this harsh world, the brokers’
Dollars that determine our conditions.

It’s clear and urgent that we find new games
To animate the shuffle we endure,
Which brings to mind our Tanja (who inflames
Our wits). She’s blonde, and not at all demure.

Her presence at the paddle tennis courts
Creates fresh rules: Empathy, Warmth, Aura—
New games for us. She touches, smiles, cavorts—
We wonder, watch, and, of course, adore her.
(11/29/12)

Plainly, some things are just not fair.
Industrial, proud Birmingham
Came to be called “brummagem”—lair,
It seems, of all things tawdry; damned,
It seems, by counterfeiters back
In sixteen thirty-seven—cheap,
It seems, meretricious—flash crap—
Imitations sold by slick creeps.

Ridiculed for a few false groats—
Noun and adjective “brummagem,”
Stuns a decent city—connotes
Sick merchandise akin to phlegm.
                        (2/27/11)

When you get right down to it, happiness—
Neither complicated nor elusive—
Feeds on luck. Birthplace, era (I confess),
Make all the difference. Duck abusive

Gods (and their priests), zigzag through plague and war
And you’re more than halfway there. Be stoic—
Less desire breeds less pain. Discard bizarre
Ambition, source of dismal stress. Heroic

Acts are not required. What you really need
Are these: temperate climate, a water
Faucet, a switch for light, a book to read
A roof, a bed, enough to eat. Sure, taut

Genitals help, along with that well-known
Jug of wine, you, lying, for pleasure prone.
                              (1/16/10)

Bemused
By my anhedonic scowl,
Bruce, down at the tennis courts,
Challenged me:
Poeticize the therapeutic title here supplied.

Face it! I am, indeed, lucky!

First, my parents left Poland
Long before the Nazi onslaught.
Thus, luckily, we escaped
The furnaces of Auschwitz,
Unlike six million others.

And they chose America!
They could have,
As many others did,
Opted for the Argentine,
Where my own left-wing
Leanings might well have
Culminated
In a drugged free-fall
From a soaring plane
To join the other countless
Disappeared.

My 1930 birth
Enhanced the luck
That shielded me.
I slipped, undrafted and unscathed,
Through all the major
Wars that marked my century,
Though twenty million others
Were less fortunate.

That same luck held
As I matured—
Healthy kids, job markets
Opening just in time.
McCarthyism, to be sure,
Was troublesome,
But didn’t injure me—
Never mind the loyalty oath
I had to sign
Before I met my first class.

I watched as Africa
Joyously escaped its masters,
Watched as liberators
Morphed to kleptocrats,
As Hutus, in one hundred days,
Murdered one million Tutsis,
As blood diamonds justified
A holocaust,
As Darfur melted in flames,
As Zimbabwe perished,
As Congolese combatants
Without discrimination,
Raped, pillaged
Everywhere.

I watched as religion
Promised paradise
To those who killed the infidel.

And here,
In god-blessed America,
I watched,
As the richest among us,
Blessed with an abundance
Impossible to spend,
Devised poisonous
New instruments
(To serve a greed
Grown pathological)
That broke the world’s
Thin spine.

But not mine!
My luck has made me comfortable,
A sturdy skiff
Adrift upon a howling sea
Of misery,
Murderous waves,
As far as I can see.
Ah, lucky me!
     (11/13/08)

Down at the beach, a friend of mine
Frowns when he reads my verse. “You’re sick,”
He says. “You need a shrink!” Sunshine,
Blue skies proclaim me heretic,

Denier of Nature’s rich trove.
A horde of gay vacationers
Enjoy the hissing surf. They love
The sun, that sea, their “great nation”—

Care-free—for them, the writhing world
An aberration best ignored.
Perhaps they’re right: the bright sea furled,
Sweet music, warm air, pleasure hoard.

But this same friend emailed the news:
Eight troops killed; fifty blown to bits
At market yesterday. Abuse
Down a tad today—just twenty

Dead—so far. Yet, the sun smiles bright.
Soft airs caress. Why give a damn?
My life’s too short. It’s not my fight.

Drat! I cannot tamp it down. Like
Bartleby, I know where I am.
                                       (5/7/07)

For Crackow’s gymnasium.²  Shloime Klotz,
The teacher said, deserved such high regard!
But, firm, his mother demurred!  “A Shagetz³
You’ll become,” she cried, “You’ll forget your God,

Lose faith, eat pigs.  Better you stay with me.”
Whereupon I gently teased: “Religion
Stunted you, put you in the I.L.G.
W.U.⁴  Denied education,

You became a wage slave, talent wasted.”
“No, no,” he laughed.  “Think! Think! I would have stayed,
Done well, and—when Poland suffered its crash—
Become a dustpan-full of Auschwitz ash.”
                                                       (2/19/07)

^{1 A small Jewish village.
2 In some European countries, a university prep school.
3 A mildly derisive term for a non-Jew.
4 The International Ladies Garment Workers Union.  My father supported our family by sewing lady’s skirts in a New York sweatshop.}

A part-time front office guy at the gym
Used to work in the industry.  A bit
Player—TV and film—he made a thin
Living—enough to pay the rent, raise kids.

When young, he trained, developed the buffed bod
That brought him west from Brooklyn seeking fame.
One time, he told me, they went on a job
Up north—cast and crew, two planes—for some lame

TV film.  When done, anxious to get home
The cast raced to the nicer plane—a treat.
All spots occupied, laughing, they faked groans,
And tardy Roy was banished—no more seats!

Disconsolate, he mingled with the freight
Piled on the other plane.  Somewhat abashed,
He mused a bit upon the nasty fate
That kept him from his friends.  But their plane crashed.

Talk about your nasty fate!  For twenty
Seared years Roy has not ventured on a plane.
Borrowed years, invested in life’s plenty,
Returned merry smiles and wide eyes.  Unfeigned,
His zest for life is easily explained.
                                           (1/10/07)