Sense Sonnet - Pumper

Sure Cure

I was a fearless four year old.
Grandma's front porch was my domain.
I grabbed a wasp. It stung me bold.
Grandma's lovin' helped ease the pain.
Later, I saw that wasp again,
And watched it fly into the shed.
I snuck up and followed it in,
And found a whole wasps' nest instead.
I shut the door so none could flee,
And took a hammer to that nest.
Grandma heard cries and came found me.
Doc gave me a slim chance at best.

But, I survived to tell the tale.
My Grandma's lovin' could not fail.

Sense Sonnet - Chiller

Bee Gone

Where have all the honey bees gone?
A lot of them have disappeared.
Nobody knows what's going on.
Worst case scenarios are feared.
Without the bees to pollinate,
The plants are unable to grow.
Starvation is the final fate,
As the food chain ceases to flow.
We took for granted benefits
The bees provide to us for free.
The fed up urge to call it quits,
We should not wish upon a bee.

With pollination incomplete,
We best rethink how we can eat.

Sense Sonnet - Acher

Vow Breaking Point

Malaysian monks are in a fix.
Their temple has been overrun
With stinging ants, and that conflicts
With remedies that might be done.
Nonviolence, the monks are bound,
And thus, they cannot hurt the ants.
Peaceful attempts go round and round,
Notwithstanding all prayers and chants.
To vacuum up was the last try,
And take the ants to woods away.
But, the ants returned, by and by,
Apparently intent to stay.

By the way, a vacuum can hurt.
Just ask any lint, dust or dirt.

Sense Sonnet - Tickler

Turnover

At the lake, there were boats to rent,
Loaned out at an hourly rate.
One job for the ticket agent
Was to make sure no boats were late.
With megaphone, he hailed a boat,
"Attention number 99,"
"Your time is up to be afloat."
"Now, please pull to the docking line."
A boat boy asked how that could be.
"We've only got," the boat boy said,
"Boats up to number 83."
The agent sighed and shook his head.

He called out, "Number 66 -"
"Are you in a bit of a fix?"

Sense Sonnet - Steamer

Wasting Away

Mankind was never satisfied
With natural evolution.
We wanted more, and so we tried
Industrial revolution.
Quick fix products were in demand.
Consumption was the main desire.
So much we did not understand;
But, what the hell, let's play with fire.
Over the years we've man made things
To gorge ourselves from womb to tomb.
We grabbed at careless offerings,
Because we are what we consume.

Each time we breathe and wash and taste,
We are dump sites for poisoned waste.

Sense Sonnet - Pumper

Sweetness of Life

He loved the game and played it well.
The pride and joy of Soldier Field.
His spirit helped the Bears excel
To be the champs his drive would wield.
At his own time, he did retire
From active duty in the game.
His life continued to inspire
By serving needs in his good name.
Yet when his health began to fail,
It was his way to die, to choose
To work so others might avail
Of life savers, he could not use.

Some won, some lost, but in each quest,
Walter Peyton showed us the best.

Sense Sonnet - Chiller

Fatal Consumption

When my grandma was just a girl,
Her family lived on a farm.
Grandma had a sister named Pearl,
Who was always finding some harm.
Grandma's mother was baking some bread.
She left the kneaded dough to rise.
Pearl snuck the dough outside and fled,
Thinking she'd snagged a tasty prize.
She went behind the storage shed,
And gobbled down all the dough.
Sometime later, they found Pearl dead,
Her stiffened body bloated so.

The dough rose from the abdomen,
Pushing the heart up to the chin.

Sense Sonnet - Acher

Hate Fully

My ex-husband was a sick man.
A restraining order was not
Going to stop his deranged plan
To do what would hurt me a lot.
I told the cops I got a call.
He had our daughter by force,
And was going to end it all.
She begged, but he had no remorse.
All I could do was wait and pray
That she be found unharmed. Instead,
The cops visited me to say
That both of them had been found dead.

My little girl was only eight,
A victim of her father's hate.

Sense Sonnet - Tickler

Ups and Downs

I'm up for grabs - that's the lowdown;
Down for the count for the close up.
I'm up a tree if I'm let down,
And down the drain goes my buildup.
If up in arms, I'll just break down,
And down the line woe my blow up.
Up in the air, I want touch down;
Come down to Earth with no touchup.
What's up my sleeve is no showdown.
There's down the hatch for my backup.
Up front you're making me melt down.
Down to the wire, my drives pick up.

Hands down, please help me to bone up,
As rubdown strokes become what's up.

Sense Sonnet - Steamer

Condemned

A babe is born - so frail and small,
But bears a burden full and great;
A virus having wherewithal
To deal the child a deadly fate.
It is a terror badly cast
Upon a newborn innocence,
Whose future is doomed by the past
Of someone else's consequence.
The tiny babe will only feel
The worst of what a life would give;
From which there is no known appeal -
Dying before the chance to live.

The little life cries out as though
To say, "My time is short - I know."

Sense Sonnet - Pumper

Use Age

Upon her eightieth birthday,
Helen Keller was asked to tell
How with one aging anyway,
How one could do it hoping well.
She gave the question some deep thought.
Then with a smile upon her face,
"The answers best that I have sought,"
She said, "Come with a childlike grace."
"Wonder - a fount of youth can be."
"No matter how wrinkled the skin,"
"I keep my curiosity"
"About the whole world I live in."

"Count your interests, not your years;"
"The burden of time disappears."

Sense Sonnet - Chiller

Uncommon Sense

The boy perhaps was nine or ten.
At first he spoke reluctantly
Of how people would die, and then
They'd reappear for him to see.
He seemed to trust me as we spoke,
Pleading with me to find a way
To rid him of all these dead folk,
That haunted him each night and day.
I asked him if he would look about,
And see if dead ones were in view.
He looked around as if in doubt;
Then said to me, "I just see you."

At last it hit me, what he said.
Because he saw me, I was dead.

Sense Sonnet - Acher

Homeless Bound

Once when I had a family,
We shared a home and lives between.
But then I got caught up in me,
And ran away at seventeen.
At first, I liked it on my own,
Moving around from here to there,
Content with going it alone,
Never needing to really share.
Over the years, my habits cost.
My home and family were gone.
I was feeling lonely and lost,
No where to go, I wandered on.

I've got no home, no family -
Just emptiness inside of me.

Sense Sonnet - Tickler

On Account

A hotel guest was checking out.
A charge for fruit was on the bill.
He asked the clerk, "What's this about?"
The clerk replied, "For fruit refill;"
"Each morning, fresh fruit was supplied."
"We ate none." said the guest, distraught.
The clerk's response was short and snide,
"The fruit was there, eaten or not."
The guest scratched out the fruit amount.
"Stop that now," said the clerk, in strife.
The guest replied, "It doesn't count -"
"With your making love to my wife."

"I did not touch your wife - I swear."
"Oh, I know that - but she was there."

Sense Sonnet - Steamer

Because

It was just a bottle of pop
I was drinking, walking to class.
Without thinking, I let it drop
From the side of the overpass.
Underneath on the interstate,
I watched as one car spun around.
Other cars tried to swerve too late.
I ran, but still could hear the sound.
The awful sound of forced impact
Of glass and metal, flesh and bone -
All exploding in fiery fact,
'Cause of a bottle I had thrown.

"Tragic car pileup," the news said,
"Cause not yet known - forty five dead."

Sense Sonnet - Pumper

Shooting Lesson

In Dry Gulch, a killer ran loose.
Black Bart had escaped from his cell,
Just as he was to get the noose.
Now, he had the town's kids in hell.
Black Bart busted into the school.
He would kill the kids one by one,
To show the town, it was a fool
To try to silence Black Bart's gun.
"Who's folks'll be the first to grieve?"
He choked on his tobacco chaw.
A chance maybe - from up her sleeve,
The school marm pulled her gun - fast draw.

Black Bart was where he'd never kill -
Six feet under, up on Boot Hill.

Sense Sonnet - Chiller

Complications

I awoke with a fierce headache.
Pain killers did not help at all.
Such agony I could not take,
And made an emergency call.
It was a bug, the doctors said,
That must have crawled in through my ear,
And now was chewing through my head.
Of course the pain would be severe.
So I received a knockout shot.
Awakened, once the bug came out,
I saw the doctors look distraught,
And asked them what it was about.

The doctors showed me the xray.
The bug had laid eggs on the way.

Sense Sonnet - Acher

Make Known

The land is lit in morning tone,
As early dawn in glow does break.
Afoot they've fled, on wings they've flown,
As creatures sensed instincts to take.
The densely populated zone
Violently begins to shake.
With nature's fury felt fullblown,
Millions of lives are put at stake.
Surrendereing its steel and stone,
The city crumbles in the wake.
Lifetimes are ripped from flesh and bone,
Lost in the wreakage of the quake.

The Earth is not for man to own.
Nature has ways to make that known.

Sense Sonnet - Tickler

In the End - What Counts

A pious pastor had just died.
He and a cabbie stood in line.
The pastor boasted in swelled pride,
That he would be preferred divine.
An angel came and led away
The cabbie through the Pearly Gate.
The pastor wondered in dismay
Why he of all souls had to wait.
He asked another angel, "Why"
"Pick the cabbie for heaven's sake?"
"You preached - folks slept," was the reply.
"The cabbie kept them wide awake."

"With him, converts were ready made."
"When people rode with him - they prayed."

Sense Sonnet - Steamer

Be Trade

The car pulled up to the curbside.
From a doorway, a woman came,
But was not waiting for a ride.
She was fortyish, he the same.
He did not ask her to get in;
But hinted that he wanted sex,
That had more of a fresher spin.
Could she provide what he expects?
She smiled and said she would come through.
Then they haggled over the price.
A deal was struck between the two -
The bargain made of sacrifice.

Her body wasn't what she sold,
But her daughter - thirteen years old.

Sense Sonnet - Pumper

Home of the Brave

There is a place called Arlington.
It was the home of General Lee.
Before the Civil War was done,
Lee's wife and children had to flee.
Before she left her home for good,
Mrs. Lee wrote and left a plea
To Union troops that shortly would
Have Arlington at their mercy.
She asked that the house not be burned,
Even though it was caught in war.
In peacetime, let the house be turned
Into a haven evermore.

Arlington, in place and in name,
Shelters freedom's eternal flame.

Sense Sonnet - Chiller

Dreamer

I couldn't wait to fall asleep,
Anxious to dream my cares away.
No need for me to count some sheep,
Soon drifting off to come what may.
I dreamed of spiders - big and brown,
Spinning their dark web over me.
I watched them slowly dangling down,
To take their helpless prey to be.
Screaming, I finally awoke.
Above me still, the spiders spun.
I knew this wasn't any joke.
My long nightmare had just begun.

I'm doomed forever, it would seem,
To wake up in the same bad dream.

Sense Sonnet - Acher

Decadent

I left the life that I once had.
It was too empty and so bare.
A world where I went willing mad
To sell my soul for fleshy ware.
It was an easy time to waste
In mask and costume made of lies,
Hungry for any tempting taste
That held the promise of a prize.
Life was a merry masquerade,
Till I had nothing left to sell.
I took the ticket that was paid,
And journey to another hell.

I guess it is a paradox -
My high priced flesh rots in this box.

Sense Sonnet - Tickler

Jolly Ready

"Ho, ho," Santa said to the elves,
"And it's time to load up the sleigh."
"Presence of time to lift ourselves;"
"Presents to Earth to give away."
"Yes, the giving season is here;"
"And, we're key - though I shouldn't brag."
"Ho, ho Rudolph - ready the deer."
"Oh, oh - where did I put that bag?"
"Let me inquire of Mrs Claus..."
"It's underneath the mistletoe."
"Dear, you know I'd like to pause"
"And smooch - but we got to go."
Yule tidings and some lipstick trace
Send Santa sleighing into space.

Sense Sonnet - Steamer

Salted Wounds

My second tour in Iraq,
And so far I'm still in one piece.
Each time that I'm under attack,
I know that the odds do increase
That I'll be wounded, maybe dead.
A buddy of mine was hit bad -
Needed lots of good care ahead.
But the VA hoops made him mad,
And he committed suicide.
Would it have been better for him,
If when wounded here, he just died?
The prospects for wounded sound grim.

My buddy went home in bad shape.
Was his real cause of death, red tape?

Sense Sonnet - Pumper

In the Nature of...

A man was watching a cocoon;
And for hours, a butterfly
Struggled in vain to be free soon.
So the man cut the cocoon tie.
With ease, the butterfly came out,
With body swelled and shriveled wings.
The man's kind thought turned into doubt,
When nature did not fix these things.
For the cocoon was meant to be
A place of prolonged struggling,
To force the fluids bodily,
Fueling the butterfly awing.

Nature uses struggle and strife
For strength to straighten into life.

Sense Sonnet - Chiller

Them

I remember well the first one,
At home, just sitting in my room.
Then they kept coming at a run.
I wasn't sure what to assume.
Nothing would make them go away.
Nobody else knew what to do.
I was interviewed on Today,
And chattered about on the View.
They'd given me celebrity.
How long would they keep going on?
Five weeks they had a hold of me.
And then one moment, they were gone.

Thanks for all those concerned "what's ups,"
With my famous case of hiccups.

Sense Sonnet - Acher

Not Missed

They found him sitting in his chair,
His lifeless eyes watching T.V.
Nobody else was living there.
Neighbors thought the house was empty.
Finding him was only by chance.
A person at the wrong address
Peeked through the glass and got a glance
Of him, just sitting motionless.
Examination did reveal
That he died from a heart attack.
His death - nobody else would feel.
His life - nobody else kept track.

The autopsy also made clear,
He'd been dead for over a year.

Sense Sonnet - Tickler

In-Law Ta-Ta

Winston Churchill was not real fond
Of Oliver, his son-in-law,
Who was ever trying to bond
By calling Churchill, "Popsey Pa."
At a dinner party one night,
"Popsey Pa," Oliver inquired,
"Of statemen you knew, which one might"
"Be the one that you most admired?"
Churchill faced Oliver and scowled.
At times Oliver made him sick.
"Mussolini," Churchill then growled.
"Popsey Pa - why such a strange pick?"

"Mussolini's creed was 'so what',"
"And ordered his son-in-law shot."

Sense Sonnet - Steamer

Anna Nicole Passed Away - Pass It On and On and...

Anna Nicole, you are the talk
Of countless lips flapping your name
Around the globe, around the clock,
On your fifteen minutes of fame.
Some characters have joined your cast,
To keep your show time going on,
However long your gig can last,
Until the public starts to yawn.
You can depend on press and air
To spin you any way they can,
To sell what is and isn't there,
While you're in the attention span.

Anna Nicole, all that be said,
Is feeding on that you be dead.

Sense Sonnet - Pumper

A Head of the Game

The pro baseball authorized cap,
For fifty years was made of wool.
In lots of plays it took the rap
For errors the players would pull.
They'd say sweat got into their eyes,
Dripping off of their wet cap's bill.
And that was their excusing whys
They weren't up to their normal skill.
A cap of polyester blend
Will now be official headwear.
The sweat and wet it now will send
Evaporating in the air.

When a player has a bad game.
This new cap should not get the blame.