week of May 21 - 27, 2007

A Man With No Teeth Serves Us Breakfast | I'd Like to Bake Your Goods | Stolen Mummies | Brendan Constantine is My Kind of Town
Up Liberty's Skirt | Feeding Holy Cats | Mowing Fargo | I'm a Jew, Are You? | Lizard King of the Laundromat | I Am My Own Orange County
Paris: It's The Cheese | Poetry Super Highway | Judaic Links | Rick's Bookmarks | Cobalt Poets
E-mail Rick | Other Cool Rick Stuff / Upcoming Readings | Who The Hell Is Rick

The Life Cycle of General Tom Thumb A Short History General Tom Thumb was born in 1838 and died in 1883. He became a world renown circus performer. He married Mercy Lavinia Bump in 1863.He was two feet, nine inches tall. Author’s Note I once lived in a house directly across the street from the Tom Thumb Museum located in Middleboro, Massachusetts. A plaque over the door read: Midgets are the last to know when it’s raining and the first to know when there’s a flood. The museum was destroyed by fire. Tom Thumb is Born Me be. Tom Thumb Comes to a Startling Realization Me wee. Tom Thumb Runs Away From Home Me flee. Tom Thumb Joins the Circus Me. Whee! Tom Thumb Goes to Paris Me. Oui! Tom Thumb Gets Married Me. We. Tom Thumb Dies Me. Free. At the Tom Thumb Gravesite Weed me. Dear Cupcake Dear cupcake, I know that if I spread you open wide and stick my tongue inside you’ll surrender your sweet cream surprise to me. I will eat you slowly and lick your sides. You’ll crumble on my sticky fingers. Long after you’re gone the taste of you will linger on. Sandy at the Beach The first time I kissed Sandy at the beach, Brewster State Park, 1963, I was standing knee deep in the fresh water pond at dawn. We conspired to slip away that way before anyone else knew we were gone. She was tall and blonde and bronze, her skin was warm and I was cold as ice. She kissed me twice. Somewhere in a parallel universe where Time stands still I am still standing still, knee deep in that pond waiting for her to press her mouth on mine and feel her shiver innocently beneath my touch.

Reading Jane Kenyon At Bird-In-Hand P.A. From Kenyon's Poem "Let Evening Come:" “God will not leave us comfortless. Let evening come.” Let early autumn sun shine through windows surrounding the new indoor pool, the enormous hot tub, almost still, no sound. Except for hum of heaters, hum of filters, here in the splendid solitude of this room with not one, but two indoor pools. Huge hot tub still, as jets stop churning, dust gathering on its surface. Ceiling fans turn swiftly, sending warm air down to the surface of the pool. Let the pool surface stir ever so slightly, from the breeze of the fans, from the action of the filters below. Let there be peace, The glow of late afternoon sunshine on potted plants, dieffenbachia and tall palms, in the pretend-tropics of this enormous room. Let there be no thought of tomorrow, neither of the workaday world back home nor of the threat of cancer, of dis-ease, nor unease of regret for things that cannot be undone. Let the wind blow through the golden leaves of autumn, seen through tall windows, caress the rusty gold of one huge oak in the distance. Let the sun shine on green grass, One crow calling from a treetop, cows that meander slowly in a far off field, the black horse trotting so smartly on the road, returning his Amish owner to his farm. Oh, Jane, you were so right: God will not leave me comfortless-- let winter come. Previously published in Elizabeth's recent chapbook--published by Northwind Publishing of Red Bank, New Jersey.