Sonshine Day!

The Son has been a sour lad of late, partly because of the usual political bullshit, and partly because I've spent the week fighting off some low-level virus, flu, exhaustion, whatever it was, plus performing blue collar labor on top of it.

Blarghhh.

But today, I feel so much better, thank you, and I don't want to waste this good feeling on harsh opinions. Instead, the Son is all about the love, the sharing, the smiling in the face of hatred, fear, and contempt, the daisy in life's rifle barrel.



The boy's been writing up a storm of late -- mysteries, historical essays, and most impressively, poems. Here's one he composed this week.

Haunted Mansion

The neighbors, a ghost in his mansion.
I know it!
The dogs are Zombies!
The cats are vampires!
The tv's a mummy!
The books are ghosts!
The statues are alive!
The birds are skeletons!
I must be brave!
So I can borrow a cup of coffee.

Of all of the boy's creative work of this period, the above is definitely a keeper.

Upon reading this, I was reminded of a Michael O'Donoghue poem that appeared in the Evergreen Review in 1965.

The Untimely Demise of Madame X
(or)
"Shot in Her Box at the Opera"
. . .to Benjamin Peret, 1928.

My airplane is burning.
My formal gardens cross their legs.
Negroes have eaten up my sister.

My mother have been revoked.
Gypsies stole my father,
Repainted him,
And sold him across the border.

My wife is a sailor.

My wolves are housebroken.
My cat is a dog.
The goldfish drowned.

Emery dust in my monorail.

My arsenal is doves.
My caprice is annotated.
The bathtub tried to bite me
And did.

Hunchbacks gave me money.

My screams are dead snowflakes
Falling on dead people
Making them feel all warm and loved.

While the boy (thankfully) lacks O'D's fascination with death, there are similarities in cadence and image. And the boy's only 10. O'D was in his mid-20s when he wrote the above. I like the kid's artistic chances.

The wife showed me the following clip this morning, which helped to sharpen my Sonny outlook:



But for me, few could top Bugaloo Caroline Ellis, who made many of my Saturday mornings most delightful.



Have a happy weekend, Sonsters! And remember: take only what you need, and know your dealer.