I Surrender

Antony's Trump Speech

Antony’s Speech Adapted for Modern Times

Friends, Romans, countrymen, listen (sniff). I, Mark Antony, have actually come here to bury Caesar, not praise him. The bad men do is remembered after their deaths, but the good everybody buries. It is going to be the same with Caesar. Brutus—he’s a loser I’m just saying… told you Caesar was mean. If that’s true, it’s bad, really, really bad and Caesar has paid for it in spades. (sniff, sniff) Now this Brutus and the others—they’re bad, really, really bad; I hear they are rapists, drug guys and such and I think they’re letting the barbarians take your jobs—I’m here to talk at Caesar’s funeral. He was my friend, he was good to me most of the time, Antony. But Brutus says he was bad, really really bad, but then he’s a loser so there you go. Look at him. Does he look like a Senator? When I’m emperor I’ll have him in jail—even if you remember he brought incredible, amazing billions to the city.

Is this the work of an amazing guy? When the deadbeats cried, Caesar was amazing. Really incredible. Get-up-and-go shouldn’t be so soft. Yet Brutus says he was bad, but Brutus is a loser (sniff), really bad, a billion times worse. You all saw that on feast day I offered him a king’s crown three times, and he refused it the 3rd times. Three times, I’m saying. Amazing. Tremendous. Hell, you wouldn’t probably have cared if he’d speared someone on the Senate floor, am I right? I, (sniff) Antony, ask. Was this right? Yet Brutus says he was not okay, that he was bad. But, no question, Brutus is a loser—probably, certainly a devil. I am telling you, Brutus lies; he lies a lot. You all loved him once, remember? Incredible. Amazing. Then what is going to stop you from being sad now? Men have become liars, and probably rapists and bad, just really bad! Listen to me, Mark Antony. My heart is actually in the coffin there with Caesar, and I must stop until I get it back. (he sniffles)

Sniff, only yesterday the word of Caesar might have been bad, probably bad. Now he lays there worth nothing, a loser. Oh, sirs, if I pissed you off, I probably piss off Brutus and Cassius, but, you all know, they’re creeps. They’ve done far badder stuff than Caesar. I will form a special prosecutor to deal with those crooks. Crooked Brutus, crooked Cassius. Hell, attack them. I’ll pay your fines for it. I Mark Antony will win. But here’s a paper with Caesar’s seal on it. I found it in his room—it’s his will. Listen, I’ll read this. I’ll follow it. I’ll make Rome great again using the great Caesar’s economic plan in this will. Caesar loved you losers. He loved you a lot. Really, incredibly a lot. You won’t believe how much he loved you. You aren’t Arabs, you aren’t barbarians—you’re men. And, being men, the crap in Caesar’s will is going to make you mad, really, incredibly mad. It’s better that you don’t know. Shut up, will you? Put a sock in it. Don’t be pu*&#@s. The men who stabbed Caesar are stupid. I was totally against stabbing Caesar from day one. You’re going to get rich and taxes are going to be lowered, just imagine that! And no barbarians are going to be taking your jobs.  I’ll read the damn will. Circle around incredibly dead Caesar, and let me show you his will. Well? Move aside, losers!

Don’t press up against me. Security! Let’s get security in here. Rough those laggards up a little on the way out. Throw them out.

If you have tears, cry you big babies. Really big. Too big. I, Antony, am saying…

Bumble Bee Hive

          Bumble Bee Hive

Our adobe house in Lemitar

with its two foot thick walls

—a child could stand comfortably

in the deep set windows—

was home to a hive of bumble

bees with their thick, velvety

bodies and their slow

motion

calisthenics; I remember an old

weathered saddle frame lay splayed

in the attic—squat in the dust that was

the insulation for the tin-roofed abode.

We caught June bugs in those days

haven’t seen one in years…

and tied a crochet string

to their back leg, so their bumbling,

awkward escape-attempt-flights  

entertained us…..kids played outside

in those days. Cokes were just nine cents

and the only fat kid was Porky

  on the Timmy and Lassie show.

Excerpt from Oil Field Stories & Stories of the SW

Boredom

Lincoln

Writing

"I feel as though I could not write again. Words seem to break in my mind like sticks when I put them down on paper. I cannot see how to spell some of them. Sentences are covered with leaves, and I really cannot see the line of the branch that carries the green meanings...."

                                                              Stephen Spender

Words, words, words.

Monolith

The Dictionary

    

        

The Dictionary

In Tularosa school, first or second
grade. I was in the bathroom and
got called to the principal’s office
where I was worried I would
be punished for some infraction.
Instead, the principal presented
me with a dictionary. He had seen
me carrying an old battered one
around the school—my early love
of knowledge and words—and gave
me the signed dictionary. It became
a prized possession. Later, my parents
purchased us a set of Encyclopedia Britannica
which must have set them back a fortune
and which I enjoyed reading “for fun” in my
                      thirst for knowledge.