An apology to Adrienne.

Careless then, as he is now
He went about not asking how
As he is now - perhaps a change
For now he's left once more ashamed

Of things he's said, and things he's done
He might ascribe it all to fun
But if he did, t'would be a lie
He's just a 'hat, as I'll describe

Some hurt is not - but some is meant
Some words were said to leave a dent
A bruise, a scar, a wanton slur
If you agree, I shall concur

That he cannot be trusted now
With social grace - oh, he can bow
And praise with such astounding skill
But 'neath it all, the power thrill

Of hurting. God, I must confess
That it pains me, and I am stressed
To know these were most unneeded
Yet this warning left unheeded

I'll offer you apologies
And dress them up in autumn's breeze
But I have rendered these before
And then came back to slur some more

So bless your heart: so good, so true
With all these reperations due
I cannot think of facing you
Again, so lean once more and laugh
For life is not a paragraph

And sixty-four birthdays will not close the parenthesis.

Wanderlust

I find it queer, so odd and strange
That I so carefully arrange
My words so that if one should peek
Inside this book, perhaps to seek
A heart that isn't there at all
But seems to be - since words do fall
Often from my uncareful pen.

So I will carefully revise
And annotating, will devise
A way so if the reader's you
There's no way you could misconstrue
The meaning from my turn of phrase
Which never strays far from the praise
That you will find here once again.

The ninja, and the pirate.

A ninja and a pir-ate passed by one day
A look was all it took, and they stopped to say
Now tell me how's your wife, how's the holiday
Guess one of us should leave on a silver tray

They drew aboard a sword and a pistol out
The neighbors all awayed, how they scream and shout
And with the best of grins, they began the bout
Though no one understood what it was all about

The ninja scored a chord in the pirate's chest
The pirate's pistol punc-tured the ninja's vest
And as they fell they cried they had passed the test
"I guess we both could say that we did our best"

A ninja and a pir-ate laid down to sleep
Two boxes in a hole dug out six feet deep
But worry not my friend, don't you dare to weep
In death they found a com-rade, now ain't that sweet?