Light Verse by Tim Torkildson

Joe Biden is feisty.
Joe Biden will fight.
He’s only lacklustre
when it comes to height.
Ignoring the chilling
and heart breaking howls
that come from the depths of
Bill Clinton’s fat jowls,
he’ll front for Obama
and take all the guff;
if Playboy comes calling
he’ll be in the buff.
Republicans fear him
and run when he snaps
because if he gets them
he bites their kneecaps.
He’ll criss-cross the country.
He’ll be in your face.
The Martians will find him
in deep outer space.
Pugnacious and steady,
street-smart and true-blue,
Joe Biden, remember! –
that you’re Number Two.

Stick me with a needle
or an enema propose
but don’t suggest I listen to
those medical talk shows!
The doctors are so ghoulish
they make Dracula look cute;
no matter what the symptoms
they prescribe some eye of newt.
Their concern is never with
the patient’s own welfare.
All they want to know is
“can we bill to Medicare?”
Talking on the radio
has never cured disease;
but if the doctors could,
they’d charge for shooting of the breeze!

The world is getting smaller
is what people say & think–
and they are right, by golly!
when I watch my burger shrink.
The Whopper isn’t whopping
like it used to whop before.
They’ve shrunk the meat, the cheese,
the bun, and mayo is no more!
And if you order pizza
with a thin crust, do not chafer
that the crust is see-through
like a doily or a wafer.
But companies don’t worry
’bout this penny-pinching lag
cuz they are daily growing
the size of their damn price tag.

Conventions are a great way
to let off much greenhouse gas.
While delegates are spouting
tons of rancid biomass.
The candidates are chosen
long before these vast events.
So why they even hold them
makes so very little sense.
The television coverage
sounds just like World War Three,
but after watching just one night
I’d choose lobotomy.
It seems that every four years
we must have this Donnybrook,
and what we get for all our pains
is just another crook.

Leslie Stahl is growing older
while Mike Wallace starts to moulder.
Andy Rooney’s dull palaver
makes him sound like a cadaver.
CBS must not require
anybody to retire.

Uncle Sam is handing out
the money right and left
if you are some big business
and your profits are bereft.
Automakers in Detroit
hold out their big tin cup,
hoping that there’s plenty
in the trough on which to sup.
I guess they’ll close if they don’t get
infusions of new cash,
putting people out of work
and making Detroit crash.
Are they beggars or blackmailers?
That’s something I can’t tell;
I only know, when I need help,
I’m told to go to hell.

Snuffing out the Taliban
is really very simple;
you squeeze until they burst apart
like any common pimple.
The problem is that all the pus
soon spreads a new infection
to other countries where they can
run in a free election.
Voted in, they’ll clamor for
their sacred Shia law
and justice will be given
without mercy, in the raw.
So give them back Afghanistan
and let them mess around,
until they cut their own head off
and in their blood have drowned.

Irradiated lettuce
will be coming to your store
to squelch those nasty beasties
that into your innards bore.
Salmonella soon will be
a charming fairy tale
as you snack on spinach
and a salad of raw kale.
Gamma rays mean freedom
from the worries of disease;
so have some soda crackers
with irradiated cheese!
Technology is wonderful,
it nurtures us so well
that soon we’ll feed entire worlds
on just one cracked egg shell.
So what if everybody starts
to glow when it gets dark?
It won’t be long before we’re
sipping on a malted quark!

Poverty is relative –
unless you’re living in it.
Then you’d trade for anything
in a New York minute.
Wealth does not bring happiness
or so the sages say;
but give me wealthy misery
at any time of day!
God throws money out his door
to land on Earth wherever;
those who stumble over it
think of themselves as clever.

*****************************

Caffeine drinks that give you wings
are not my cup of tea.
Why should I be wide awake
and yet so jittery?
Heaven is a feather bed
with no alarm clock ticking;
paradise contains no boss,
waiting — tongue a-clicking.
Maybe I will sleep through life
until the Second Coming,
then awaken to the gentle
strains of harps a-strumming.
But if I miss the Judgement Day
just send the text in full,
and don’t expect a quick response
cuz I won’t touch Red Bull.

The recipes in magazines
sound scrumptious, I agree,
but where to find ingredients
they list — a mystery!
They call for capers in rum sauce
or powdered baby’s breath –
and other stuff that you might get
from witches in Macbeth.
A double-boiler’s called for,
and maybe a shad plank,
cheesecloth and a centrifuge
and pickled oxen shank.
How I’ve longed these many years
to cry “bon appetite!”
but wind up serving pizza
on a dented cookie sheet.