OLD FOGEYS

This song never gets old

But your conversation does.

“This song never gets old.”

I hear you telling the person 

on your other side.

We’re listening to “Can’t You See”

and an old fogey

has to ruin it

with the standard old fogey complaint:

“This song is a classic.

Everything new sucks.  

It’s all forgettable.”

I can remember a day
when even older fogeys

were making the same rip

on his favorite tunes.

I remember when Tom Petty

was a pedestrian rocker.

I remember when the Clash

and the Talking Heads were

called disposable by fogeys.

You are right about one thing.

This song may never get old

but you damn sure have.

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/fuche_bu/poem/1063766

NO BETTER PLACE TO BE

It’s Tuesday afternoon

we should

probably have jobs

we should

probably have better things to do

and yet here we sit

A loud belch

from across the bar

recalls a shot of cheap whiskey

and another bottle of beer

is placed in front of me

Freddie Mercury is singing,

“Fat Bottomed Girls”

on an old fashion jukebox

I realize that I really

have no better place to be

a bum I might otherwise

look down upon

throws a kernel of popcorn at me

to keep me from nodding off

A guy wearing too much cheap cologne

occupies the stool next to me

I have to face away

as the fragrance of cheap booze

is more palpable

I down a shot of tequila

and reminisce about a girl

that I used to know

oh so many years ago

Somehow,

that all got messed up

My beer is 3 quarters full

and depressingly, sadly

I really don’t have

any better place to be

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/georgeschaefer/poem/1102807

CASH ONLY

A sign sets you straight:

It’s a cash only bar

and a bottle or Red Stripe

will set you back 3 bucks

It’s a dank bar

and most of the patrons

seem to be local

I hear “Hold on Loosely”

on the jukebox

and I’m suddenly remembering

a bad 80’s comedy “Spring Break”

even though the movie

used “Caught Up in You”

Some bands sound the same

regardless the song they play

although I used to crush big time

on the actress in the film

whose name I no longer remember

I see one of the locals

ordering a shot of Fireball

and on a dare

I order one too

In this situation

It’s just the right thing to do

Of course,

the guy bathed

in way too much cheap cologne

has to sit within 5 feet

Bring back social distancing

for the love of God

the sweat of the unwashed masses

is far less offensive

In turning away to save my nose

I notice the TV is running

“Oh Brother, Where Art Thou”

on a fuzzy screen

I’m not a man of constant sorrow

I feel great joy

an awful lot of the time

but a subversive film

in a local bar

deserves another shot of Fireball

another shot, another beer

set back another 8 bucks

It might be a long night after all

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/georgeschaefer/poem/1102779

CLEAR PATHWAY HOME

Quietly nursing a beer

anxiously awaiting a cup of chili

listening to two young ladies

that somehow lost their way—

couldn’t rent a car

couldn’t get a hotel,

missed a concert, had a 5 AM flight

a lot of porno flicks start out like that

but I’m not qualified to direct or star

I come up short

in both categories

no skill with a camera

and well, you know

we don’t need to go there

It’s not common decency

keeps me from posting dick pics

I wish I had words of wisdom

or at least some witty repartee

but I sit quietly sipping beer

a game is played by God knows who

airing on a flat screen TV

I feign interest in the action

It’s fucking baseball
I’d have a better chance popping a boner

watching paint dry on a fence

the two young ladies converse

with an elegant elderly woman

they’re having a good time

in spite their run of bad luck

I can see I’m not needed here

but the chili is warming

and I have a clear pathway home

and a dog waiting there

that actually does think I’m special

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/georgeschaefer/poem/1109907

YOU REALLY SHOULD KNOW BETTER

You’re 57 years old

You really should know better

(and you do know better)

but knobbly knees

you go with the flow

and succumb to darker angels

You are old enough

You really do know better

yet still

you make the call

a shot of Rock and Rye

Original Jacquins

experiments in liquor

and the effects on human bodies

way too early, way too late

pretend you don’t know better

it’s still mid afternoon

and shots have been absorbed

You’ll regret it in the morning

You’ll regret it in an hour

You really do know better

and yet still

here we are

sitting in a local watering hole

and it’s happening

You hear the chatter at the bar

It reaches deafening levels

with only about six people speaking

getting louder and louder

You watch the bartender pour the shot

Regrets will be abundant

but it’s still a moment

lived in real time

for better or worse

You’re 57 years old

You really should know better

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/georgeschaefer/poem/1127168

PART OF THE PROBLEM

so I descend

wishing to traverse time

Hemmingway drank here

with a cast of ne’er do wells,

pirates and twisted characters

but the color and flavor

altered and diminished

by tourists eyes glued

to hand held devices

complaints about hotel pillows

irreparably destroy the mood

I’m drinking craft beer

out of a souvenir plastic cup

so I have to own the moment

that I’m part of the problem, too

I look across the street

at souvenir shops

guessing they weren’t there

when Ernest was getting plastered

and regaling his court of misfits

It occurs to me that

a great novel isn’t going

to be started tonight

Maybe we’ll just settle

for a whiny ass poem

about how much things change

I can gripe about modern life

and all its folly

and skillfully omit

how much I’ve also become

an epic part of said problem

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/georgeschaefer/poem/1102676

THE ELECTRIC JIMMY SWAGGART ACID TEST

It can be really intense when you take acid and I’m not talking about fake shit.  I mean reality and real intensity.  There was one time when I dosed with a few friends.  It was good liquid about 250 mikes a hit.  I indulged in two hits.

We were restless so someone go the bright idea to cruise over to Lambertville and climb the Devil’s Tea Table.  This was a small mountain in New Jersey that had a small rock formation at the top known as the Devil’s Tea Table.

So now you have 6 guys with heads full of acid climbing a mountain at sunset with a single flashlight.  Everyone made it up the mountain alive but it the sun had quickly faded into night.  It was time to head back down the mountain.  The batteries in the flashlight went dead on us so we were trying to use lighters.  The lighters didn’t provide much in the way of light.  The crescent moon wasn’t providing much help either.

There were points that it was real dark.  You could occasionally hear animals and insects and it was hard to see what you were stepping on.  It was a dangerous game played in the dark.  I remember almost stepping off a cliff.  A couple times tree branches sought for support were snapped by our weight.

There were portions of the descent, I was simply on my back sliding down the cliff slowly.  It was a truly life affirming experience.  My survival instincts kicked into overdrive.  I was like:  “ I want to live!  I WANT TO LIVE!”  

Let me get down off this mountain.  I reached a point that I didn’t care about the dirt.  I didn’t care about the bugs or  the poison ivy.  I just want to get down off this mountain.  We all used our voices to guide one another and we all slowly made our way down the mountain.

“I want to live!” and live I did.  We all got down the mountain alive and returned to a friend’s house.  We were all hyperventilating.  A couple guys left and went home.  There’s a couple guys from this night that I never saw again.

A couple of us dropped another hit and drank some more beer.  It was now morning.  The TV was on and somehow the channel we turned on featured Jimmy Swaggart putting on a hilarious performance.  He was pointing out all us sinners.  We were all in stitches laughing at his sermon.  It was incredibly funny at that particular moment.

To put it in context, I foolishly risk my life on a mountain for no good reason and return to this shit:  a flimflam preacher related to Jerry Lee Lewis going on a rampage.  It takes a strong dose of acid to be able to appreciate the subtle absurdity of the moment.  Kareem Abdul Jabbar was right.  The dilemmas life throws at us are often rather insane and absurd but at least now we can all laugh about it.

https://www.postpoems.org/authors/fuche_bu/prose/1064676

based on a true story from over 3 decades ago.  The Kareem Abdul Jabbar reference is to a quote from a 1982 Playboy interview where he said “I don’t think you can fully appreciate all the subtle absurdities of life until you’ve taken a powerful hallucinogen.”