Despite the nature of a lot of my poems I do try to laugh as much as I can, life may be a tragedy but every tragedy needs a comedy. I used to write a lot more comedy and I was reminded that we all need to laugh maybe now more than ever, but it’s not easy trying to be funny for the sake of being funny so I was conflicted. The following poem is an illustration of that very conflict.

Also… the image I used as a background for the poem is a photo I took some time ago of a very expensive looking car with a traffic cone placed on its hood. I did not place the traffic cone on the car, I was merely walking down the street and came across it but I felt compelled to take a photograph, while doing so a man in a suit not featured in the image approached me as he was irate. Saying things like, “Do you know how much this car costs?” and asking things about my thoughts like, “What were you thinking?” and so on… I told the man the cone was there when I got there, I just found it amusing. I mean, the car being parked illegally and the gentlemen’s fury was funny enough in itself, but he had to continue and ask me what was so funny specifically and he was surprisingly not amused at all when I replied, “Well… it’s a uniCARn.” How was I not going to take a photo? I suppose comedy is subjective.

LET ME TELL YOU A JOKE

They told me to write something funny

Said it might make me some more money

They say my poems were too much of a bummer

Have me catching a bus when I could be driving a hummer

Said I should be cashing cheques to meet my worth

Instead I’m too broke to pollute up the earth

So I’ll leave sadness behind and let hilarity ensue

Why did the chicken cross the road?

He didn’t

Because he was tired of being told what to do

Is that funny enough for you?

I’m just a man with a pen

A puppet on a string

Let me be entertaining

Let me be just a thing

Something else to manipulate

Mould me like clay

Shape me for whoever’s around

I’ll be your joker

I’ll be your clown

Stick my neck out like a giraffe

If they insist I’ll make you laugh

At the risk of my words making me choke

I prepared a glorious joke

Knock Knock

You want me to ask who’s there

The person who’s home doesn’t seem to care

So leave the door unanswered

The punchline is cancelled

No laughter to be found

Laughing out loud is a forgotten sound

I’ve forgotten how to be funny

Don’t remember how to chase money

So to the bar I went

Figured my sorrows could be drowned

With all the comedy refusing to be found

I had to break free

So I shook off all the people trying to ride me

Walked into the bar

And ordered myself a drink

To see how low I could sink

I was on the precipice

I was on the brink

Just an animal unable to think

I asked for a whiskey and a beer to chase

Bartender asked why I had such a long face

And it didn’t take me long

To realize I’d been a horse all along