Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

“Loving your country does not mean lying about its history.”

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Never give a known liar the benefit of the doubt.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

The willow is too close to the house.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

Innocent people do not delay justice.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

No one could have predicted…

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

“woke” is the new caravan.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

You are here: Home / Authors In Our Midst / Peter H. Desmond – Poet in Our Midst!

Peter H. Desmond – Poet in Our Midst!

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This post is in: 

Hi, it’s phdesmond, and I’m very pleased that John and WaterGirl have given me this opportunity to show some of my work from over the years.  Both my parents had read the poetry classics and were able to write light verse for occasions like birthdays and anniversaries.  It’s a family tradition I kept up.  I’m hoping you will enjoy at least some of my work!

Peter Desmond – Poet in Our Midst!
Photo credit: Photo: Paula Savoy

In Memoriam

We don’t forget the unjustly slain.

Minneapolis Blues

On the streets of Minneapolis, we saw another life destroyed,
prone on the pavement.  Four policemen killed George Floyd.

A brute’s knee on his neck, a mob of blue knees on his back —
he died of asphyxiation and a fatal heart attack.

They’ll hear their verdict standing.  I really want to see
all four cops convicted of murder and felony.

While we march for justice, the world can’t understand,
in our civilized society, why legal strangling isn’t banned.

At the Museum Café

For lunch I order matzo ball soup
before I tour the museum.

“How was it?” asks the waitress
as she wipes the table.

“It was light,”  I say, “Airy.
A dense matzo ball
is like a stone in your stomach.”

She smiles.  “Some people ask me
why it doesn’t have noodles, or carrots.”

Halfway through the exhibit
I reach the hollow boxcar
stenciled “Karlsruhe” on its side:

Karlsruhe, Rhineland hometown
of my German ancestors,
car that rolled towards Mauthausen,

crammed with Jews
from one of the
four hundred ghettos,

each with its traditions,
its folk songs,
its recipes for soup.

Various Political Poems

The most recent of these, an invective, was first published in chat right here on Balloon-Juice, on the weekend it became clear Biden had just won!  The others date back decades.

An Inauguration Tune

Trump is gone, and none too soon!
Angry, smug, grotesque buffoon,
stupid-suited Pantaloon,
Queens brat trying to play tycoon,
piccolo posing as bassoon.

No more poison-gas balloon,
orange-caked, pale-eyed raccoon,
whose nightly hissing at the moon
has made this country his spittoon —
on January twentieth, at noon!

Paradox

You who think the embryo
has a fully human soul,
you who call abortion sin —
hear the paradox of twins.

In the caverns of the loins
a sperm and egg have joined.
Soon the cell divides;
the cluster grows in size.

A future member of our race
drifts towards its nesting place.
What’s this?  The cluster splits,
separates in equal bits.

Strange, but true —
what was one is two:
two tiny particles,
genetically identical.

You who claim to speak for God —
don’t you find it rather odd
one egg became two twins?
Tell me when the soul begins.

At the moment of conception,
before their separation,
was there one soul, or two?
Does this problem puzzle you?

Was this a miracle:
two souls in one particle?
Or did one soul split
and half go in each bit?

Or do you think that sperms have souls?
Will you banish birth control?
Does it make you squirm
when I mention sperm?

Monks chanted “Tibi Deo”
as the Church judged Galileo,
but the earth still revolves,
and humanity evolves.

Black Body Radiation

Brothers and sisters, it makes me mad
when they use the word “black” to mean it’s bad.
The stock market crashes, and they blame it on us.
They call it “Black Monday” in the front of the bus.
It wasn’t my fault; I didn’t lose them a cent.
I have enough trouble just paying my rent.
But not for long — I found my path:
I take courses at night; I study science and math.

I walk into the college.  They think I’m a looter
until I sit down to use the computer.
The lab supervisor turns benevolent
as my fingers dance on my instrument.
I solve the problem; I’m proud as hell.
My high school teacher taught me well,
so I know physics and calculus.
I know more than those suckers in the front of the bus.

I read it in my physics text:
black absorbs and white reflects.
Black fills up with energy;
white just shines and lets it be.
I’m here to tell the United States
that absorbed energy radiates.
And here’s one meaning of what I learned —
if you lean on black you might get burned.

I don’t care if you like it or not,
it’s a scientific fact that black is hot.
Without black body (hear me now!) radiation
this land would be an iceberg nation.
Today is the day, and now is the hour —
the country needs the thermal power
of thirty-five million dynamos.
It’s time to let my people glow.

Parodies

I’ve always felt that a parody is sincere praise of the original poem, as well as an opportunity to say something new.  The second one highlights my home town for the last fifty years, Cambridge, Mass.

La Belle Dame Sans Culottes

(After John Keats.) Read the original poem.

O, what can ail thee, macho man,
Alone and vainly swaggering;
The music’s stopped, the disco’s closed,
You ding-a-ling.

I met a lady at the bar.
We got to talking for a while.
Her hair was long, her skirt was short,
Her dancing wild.

As we salsa’ed in the crowd
I fell in love. She looked so fine.
And I observed beneath her dress
No panty line.

I took my little notebook out.
I asked “When can we meet again?”
But then she told me, “Sorry,
I’m Lesbian.”

Her girlfriend showed up on the floor
And said, “We’d like to be alone.”
The two of them began to dance
And make sweet moan.

I trudged despondent to the bar
And told my buddies of my pain.
They cry’d, “La belle Dame sans culottes
Has struck again!”

And that is why I loiter here
Alone and vainly swaggering.
I’d go home but I feel like such
A ding-a-ling.

The People’s Republic of Cambridge

(after W.B. Yeats) (read the original: https://poets.org/poem/lake-isle-innisfree)

I’ll rise and take the T now to Cambridge-on-the-Red-Line,
and wear a kaffiyeh, bomber jacket, and beret.
I’ll find an apartment, a rent-controlled one-bedroom
to house my bike, my print of Che.

And I shall work for peace there, though peace comes very slowly.
How long will it take till oppressors all are smashed?
I’ll read magazines that stand up for the lowly,
be gender neutral, recycle trash.

I’ll rise and take the T now — it causes less pollution —
and settle in a city whose leftist roots are deep,
whose citizens still argue the need for revolution.
We wake; the country lies asleep.

 

Reader Interactions

70Comments

  7. 7.

    WaterGirl

    I am finally getting to read these!  As I put the post together I was concerned with details of the post, and formatting, but now I get to enjoy the content.

    I love all of the first five poems.  They all speak to me.  (Not being familiar with the originals, the parodies are a bit lost on me.)

  8. 8.

    There are those who call me...tim... (Still posh)

    I am literally at a loss for words, as you have just used most all of the words in the best possible manner, and now I just…you know. Damn, dude. Thank you.

  19. 19.

    WaterGirl

    If you would like your talent featured in the Artists in Our Midst series, send me an email message.  Don’t be shy!   I don’t think anyone has regretted being featured. :-)

    We have a composer in the queue for next week, but it’s all Authors posts after that.

    So please get in touch if you would like to be featured as an Artist or an Author.

  20. 20.

    WaterGirl

    @phdesmond: Yes, line spacing issues in WordPress with the poetry.  But only for some of the poems!  All the first poems had to be copied in line by line, but 2 of the later ones you sent were able to be copied with the correct spacing.

    I am guessing that it depended on what the original source document was for each poem.

  22. 22.

    Athena Andreadis

    Wonderful, Peter, like all your poetry.  Loved At the Museum Café and Black Body Radiation — and of course the phrase “piccolo posing as bassoon” deserves to become immortal.

  23. 23.

    phdesmond

    @Susan:

    Susan!  welcome to Balloon-Juice!

    you wear several hats yourself, I know, from long association with you.  you should check out the Sunday morning gardening chat thread, a weekly feature with lots of pix.

  29. 29.

    Sure Lurkalot

    Very nice verses, you draw provoking images. Thanks for sharing your work.

    So poetry is a family tradition…do you have siblings that write it as well?

  31. 31.

    Mary Lee Wile

    Thank you, Peter, for this selection of poems!  I particularly appreciate the vitriol in “An Inauguration Tune” and “Minneapolis Blues,” but my favorite is “At the Museum Cafe.”

  33. 33.

    SiubhanDuinne

    I found Minneapolis Blues especially moving, and I loved the parodies, especially La Belle Dame Sans Culottes — the title alone made me laugh aloud! But it’s hard to pick a favourite from among this fine assortment. Thanks for sharing your work with us.

  37. 37.

    StringOnAStick

    At the Museum Cafe says so much with such few words. My husband’s family is only alive because one preteen was off looking for food when the Nazi’s wiped out the villagers; so many recipes for soup, gone in an afternoon.

  38. 38.

    phdesmond

    @StringOnAStick:

    i was thunderstruck when i realized that a chance comment at lunch, recollected a few hours later, would make my borning poem so much of what it is.

  43. 43.

    Ajabu

    I know the thread is probably dead but,
    Damn, Peter – I absolutely love Black Body Radiation. Speaks to me and my entire family. Thank you for that and all of them!

  44. 44.

    phdesmond

    @Ajabu:

    i’m glad you read Black Body Radiation!  i’m particularly proud of it.  it began as a personal exercise — write something where “black” is “good,” not its opposite. :-)

    thanks for noticing,

    peter

  45. 45.

    Ajabu

    @phdesmond:

    It was particularly interesting to me because in the 70’s I wrote a song called “White Lies” that did just that. Redefined the concept with new definitions.
    Blackmail- a letter from my girlfriend.           Blacklist- who’s invited to the party.                  Blackball- Y’all know what that is…     etc.    Never recorded it but probably should have. Too Afrocentric for the times.

  46. 46.

    phdesmond

    @Ajabu:

    the times have changed.  do you do poetry as well as songs?

    poetry is cheaper than music to peddle!  but the delays in hearing from editors are pretty  discouraging.

  48. 48.

    Ajabu

    @phdesmond:

    I don’t do poetry per se but I do write lyrics (essentially the same thing). One of my early collaborators was an accomplished poet turned Black children’s book author, Joyce Carol Thomas. You might want to check her out. She died in 2916 but her work is all online.

    I’m going to bed. Get my email from water girl.  Stay in touch!

  49. 49.

    Wolvesvalley

    All of these are wonderful. I especially liked — each for a different reason — “At the Museum Café,” “Paradox,” “Black Body Radiation,” and “La Belle Dame sans Culottes.” Thank you for sharing them, and I would like to read more of your work.

  51. 51.

    JimV

    I liked the Twin Paradox at first, but I thought of two possible answers. 1) God put two souls in the egg at its conception, that’s why He split it. 2) He added another soul out of His backlog when the split happened.

    That is, if you’re willing to believe in magic, nothing is impossible, nothing can be ruled out. My argument is that magic explains nothing since how it works is inexplicable. “God did it” is just another way of saying, “I don’t know how it was done.” Since it explains nothing and has no hard evidence, the God Hypothesis is therefore not worthy of belief.

    They will claim the Bible as hard evidence, but I have heard that many who go into seminaries and study the actual provenance of the Bible lose their faith as a result.

    Granted, we all probably have some believed opinions which aren’t well-founded.

  56. 56.

    KSinMA

    Thanks for your wonderful poems!  I especially liked the Yeats parody. That and the Baltasar translation. Lovely!

  57. 57.

    LiminalOwl

    Beautiful poems, Peter. Thank you. “At the Museum Cafe” brought tears, and “Black Body Radiation” is wonderful.

  60. 60.

    Jess

    Peter! Loved these! Especially Museum Cafe and La Belle Dame. I’m in central Mass and come into Cambridge when I can; maybe our paths will cross sometime and we can sit down over coffee and talk poetry. Once in a blue moon I write something I’m proud of, but most of the time poetry writing, or what makes a great poem great, is a wondrous mystery to me.

  61. 61.

    phdesmond

    hey, Jess, sounds good to me.  we can ask WaterGirl to give us each other’s email addresses, and then set something up.

  63. 63.

    Charlene

    Peter,

    I was with the women’s march yesterday (or should I say yet again?). And those same “good ol boys” shouted at us from behind police lines. Your poem is a fitting retort. . .

  65. 65.

    Wolvesvalley

    @phdesmond: 
    Many, many thanks for the link to the two aubergine poems (both of which feature absolutely delightful rhymes). Also for the link to the original of the Baltasar del Alcazar poem, which made me doubly appreciate the cleverness of your translation.

  67. 67.

    Artist

    Peter, I am so glad I checked my emails.
    Thank you for your humor.
    Your uniqueness, love of words.Thanks for sharing. Francesca

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