Reproachable Optimists



  Reproachable Optimists

  Nathaniel S. Rounds

  Copyright Nathaniel S. Rounds 2011

  This free ebook may be copied, distributed, reposted, reprinted and shared, provided it appears in its entirety without

  alteration, and the reader is not charged to access it.

  ISBN 978-0-9877346-0-0

  ©Copyright 2011, Nathaniel S. Rounds

  Published by Fowlpox Press.

  This is an Egg Tooth Imprint.

  Contents

  A rambling soliloquy about shotgun-toting ducks in the everglades, followed by a monogram featuring the use of jujubes for good rather Than evil. Also some lyrics to an 18th century folksong concerning hygiene, as generally perceived then, i.e., “to bathe seldom shall lessen thoughts of impropriety”, etc., etc. Afterwards, the author invites himself over to your house, and asks to sleep on your sofa. That’s a dozen pages or so there. Then you close the book and glance nervously through window, waiting for certain doom. But nothing happens, and so you open a bag of nachos and eat them with butter, because you’ve always liked them that way. And that’s just wrong. Well go ahead, then, if it makes you feel better. But it shouldn’t.

  Dark-Sword Grass

  Uncle Uz

  He was

  A stuffed crust confessional

  Freeze-dried absurdist

  And

  Moon in the valley of Ajalon

  His

  Apple sack belly

  Burst through unzipped slit

  Of calfskin leather jacket

  Colour-matched to ship’s sail of

  Face

  Torn

  By sun and sea

  Uncle Uz snored and

  Sparked commands through noontime nap

  He cried “Nicotiana!” and proclaimed

  “STOP

  The incessant guitars

  For I shall TOUCH (!)

  And beautify

  Profound Taxi

  And maim egregious them

  “STOP

  The creedless

  The sharp-nozzled

  The cankered

  “Eviscerate with safety scissors

  Cheap smokes for third-world tots

  Pee on snuff and spoils of office

  Burgle the breeches of marauder bands

  “For I shall TOUCH (‽)

  And beautify

  Profound taximeter cabriolet

  And anoint its driver with

  The tenth of an ephah of burnt

  Toast

  Jacob in Esau’s Body

  In this melange de noix

  Søren Suigenocide

  The chicken gutter

  And bipolar bookbinder

  Eats

  People noodle soup.

  He approaches people and says

  “Let’s go Dutch on a Danish.

  You dilly. I’ll dally.”

  With clipboard in hand he approaches a

  Single-detached house 

  Semi-detached house

  Camp in the plains of Moab

  Row House

  Dugout canoe

  An enumerator has filled in the information above regarding three dwellings in his/her Territory. For which dwelling(s) does he provide instructions on surviving a nuclear attack?

  He sleeps in his car and drives to work at 9:00 a.m. only to find the following messages on his Desk:

  A message from a hostile Bald Knobber threatening to sing opera for the public if someone Does not call him back immediately.

  A message from a member of the public upset about having to fill out the Braille form of the Questionnaire.

  A message that an enumerator has resigned due to despair.

  Which of the following answers best represents the order in which the homeless chicken gutter Should address the issues?

  A. Just let it all go.

  B. Just let it all go.

  C. Peace on your spiritual journey. Seriously, bud, just let it all

  Go.

  Peace Work

  I’m the guy who puts the banana skins on the bananas.

  It’s peace work. Whenever I put the banana skins on

  The bananas, I feel peace.

  Most of the time, I put on the yellow ones.

  For stores that sell a lot of produce to old people,

  I put the green ones on. That’s because green means

  Go, and old people have a hard time going. They

  Like to say their going has got up and gone. So we put

  The going back into their banana skins. Of course,

  Nobody eats the skins, but the green skins

  Give you incentive. When you smell the green in the scent of the

  Banana, it makes you want to go. And for people who don’t

  Wish to buy yellow bananas or green bananas, we put on

  The black skins. These sell well to people who are mourning.

  There are quite a few mourning people. They get up first thing

  And all they want to do is jump up and die. So we give them

  A black banana with odd spots and they have something to cry

  About. It’s our way of showing we care.

 

  Do Not Place Saw on Stretcher

  I’m sorry our youngest, cruellest child

  Scratched your eye last November

  And that ever since then

  Your eye likes to declare its perennial anger

  By scabbing and weeping.

  I’m glad that after recent treatment

  You could still spy that bald eagle

  At the corner of Middle Dyke and Bains.

  However,

  Your eyesight is still wanting.

  I was that bald eagle

  At the corner of Middle Dyke and Bains.

  A New Identity, Inc.

  Sweetheart deal with a clinical social worker

  And a ghetto palm

  Results in capturing winged figure with

  Hair governed by beeswax

  Flowers forming rib vault over

  Sly exchange of dollar bills,

  New persona

 

  This Could Happen to You

  I told them not to run

  Drugstore cowboys and weekend beatniks

  Whine mendaciously about teenage suicide

  Encouraged by SUPER ANAHIST COUGH SYRUP

  And cheap canvas tennis shoes

  From the rooftop sings

  George Washington Carver

  Voice shatters glass

  This made possible by

  Running without aid of glasses into

  Stainless steel peanut crusher

  I told him not to run

  Evening sky rosy red with

  Typhoid fever

  Causing the victim to dream

  Of an alligator slipping through the cat door

  To enjoy the hospitality of the Joneses

  It might be advantageous at this time

  To run