At Rocky's Bar

That Sunday I had come to play the blues
at the open mic, but they had switched the night.
I sat there on the barstool sipping booze.

"It got moved up to Wednesday" was the news
the bartender passed on, his voice contrite.
That Sunday I had come to play the blues.

As whisky soothed my ego's little bruise,
a pretty woman plopped down on my right.
I sat there on the barstool sipping booze.

She asked me if I'd ever read Ted Hughes.
Not answering her would be impolite.
That Sunday I had come to play the blues.

She'd just seen Sylvia. It had suffused
her mind with anger at the poor girl's plight.
I sat there on the barstool sipping booze.

"I like his poetry," I said. "Hers I excuse."
She left, indignant, stomping out of sight.
That Sunday I had come to play the blues.
I sat there on the barstool sipping booze.

by David W. Landrum

David W. Landrum is Professor of Humanities at Cornerstone University, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has published poetry in many journals and magazines, including The Formalist, Iambs & Trochees, The Lyric, and Measure.

Two Double Dactyls

1.
Warblers and passiforms—
Roger T. Peterson
Showed what birds look like to
women and men,

So that we needn't be
Ornithologically
Out on a limb when we
See them again.

2.
Guns and skulduggery—
Francis Ford Coppola
Sensed that blood spurting makes
People enthuse;

Audience lust for things
Criminological
Paid him a coffer he
Couldn't refuse.

by T.P.Perrin

T. P. Perrin is a frequent contributor to The Lyric (Lyric Memorial Prize in 2005), and has had poems in Iambs & Trochees, The Neovictorian/Cochlea and elsewhere. His second-prize-winning poems on the subject of war are permanently posted on the web at winning writers.com. He lives in Binghamton NY.