What Can I Make Fresh for You Today?

WORDSWORTH IN HEMET

More than warbling, I daresay.

It was kind of like weird.

WHAT MOSES SAID

If you choose to play by fantasy rules

Be ready for what you aren’t expecting.

NEXT LEVEL SANTA

Treated like Caesar.

Wearing a mask.

Hitting a bucket of balls.

Gravity has mass.

I AM SHOUVIK

I think to myself sometimes wow.

BRENDA

I loved that little Brenda.

BACK ON DAYS

Hi my name’s Alexis what can I make fresh for you today?

POOR PIETRO

He’s a mess.

MILDRED

She looks terrible.

THERE’S NO JESSICA

In Romeo and Juliet.

THE ARNOLD SCHOENBERG EXPERIENCE – LIVE!

“Here’s a thing we like to call Pierre R.”

I MEET WITH THE MOST IMPORTANT PEOPLE IN THE UNIVERSE

Your name never comes up.

TERESA

Sit yourself down here.

Make yourself at home.

Teresa, where do you hail from?

JACK BUDDHIST

It’s mine.

KANONI

She likes that fancy butter.

WE’RE FACING AN EXISTENTIAL CRISIS, RANDY

I hate when people say my name that way.

HANK AARON

If I could write 755 home run poems

I’d be existential.

 

© 2021 Randy Stark

Please visit my website at www.randystark.com and my page at Write Up The Road.

Choice Bits: Special Sunday Edition

 On Beauty, by Zadie Smith, 2005 

The best RHYTHM in dialogue since J.D. Salinger, IMO. Everybody talks good. 

I could copy the entire novel because choice bits are everywhere. So I’ll just quote a few. 

In a classroom: 

 “…another girl who looked no older than fourteen with a railroad on her teeth.” 

Out in public (from when people congregated in public): 

“…they looked very happy—but what did that mean? Wellington couples had a talent for looking happy.” 

“Each couple is its own vaudeville act.” 

“They were smooth and bright, and their timing was wonderful, and they were young and hilarious. It was really something to see, they thought, and this was why they spoke loudly and gestured, inviting onlookers to admire.” 

“…she made you feel that just being in this moment, doing this thing, was the most important and marvelous possibility for you.” 

And here’s a discussion between Zadie Smith and another awfully good writer, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichi, who I’ve cited in a previous Choice Bits. (Skip past the intro.) 

Between the Lines: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie with Zadie Smith - YouTube

 

 Please visit my website at www.randystark.com and my page at Write Up The Road.

It's On the Truck

CHECKING

Checking and checking and checking.

THE HANDWRITING ON THE WALL

Is I don’t have premium.

ROLE PLAYING

I’m a block of suet in a cage.

Birds peck at me like Roman numerals.

MEMORY CARE

How many of the 17 avenues in Monopoly can U name?

TWO CANS OF SOUP

That’s what anger can do:

Make you crazy. Who goes to Walmart

Just to buy two cans of soup?

SCREEN POSITIVITY

I believe in what I call

Screen positivity

She said

Of her entertainment philosophy.

PLEASANTVILLE

Deadly nightshade is actually just rude more than anything.

And dead man’s curve is a straightaway.

ABACUS

Your activation is required.

HAPPINESS

It’s on the truck.

REWILDING

Home from skoo.

TWO HOURS OF HOLIDAY PAY

The lady goes it’s clearly stated in the handbook.

I told her oh no I researched it.

I told her I said I’m calling the labor board.

MEAT PHONE

I mean yeah in a way it’s kind of neat.

Definitely a total niche thing.

CLOTHES

I haven’t worn this in forever.

These I never wore.

WORRY

Is my identity now at risk after holiday shopping?

DREAM COME TRUE

I’ve always wanted to live in a shithole country.

Now thanks to your ass

USA USA USA.

BREAKFAST SPECIAL

I’ll take the two eggs, half waffle, half armadillo.

The armadillo real crisp. It'll break if you drop it. 

 

© 2021 Randy Stark

Please visit my website at www.randystark.com and my page at Write Up The Road.

Friday Special: Music!

 

These are two recent posts from Write Up The Road's blog, Head Light.

They consist of links to music and musicians I've been listening to recently. Plus a few remarks.

Music Notes, part one

Music Notes, part two

 

 

Please visit my website at www.randystark.com and my page at Write Up The Road.

Hailing

A little of this, a little of that.

I’m only a little less than two-thirds white,

One sixth black, one twelfth Native American,

And just a little more than one twelfth Mexican.

But this morning (and mornings are when I do my best work)

It was funny, it was like wait;

I’m identifying as Asian! 

How many sources of oppression have you been disadvantaged by? 

From a ten point plan

To three simple steps

Majuscule to majuscule to majuscule.

And not asking if

You want to see my penis, my dick, my schlong

Is the new normal?

I don’t know, I haven’t tried. 

I can’t stand the suspense is I guess the problem.

You just be careful I said.

Give it its due, the past.

Say Hi to the camera

If you can.

Yeah. Yeah.

Like that.

Wait, well no. 

Is that right? 

 

© 2021 Randy Stark

Please visit my website at www.randystark.com and my page at Write Up The Road.

"I Can't Get Started," performed by Sammy Davis, Jr.

Sammy Davis, Jr. on Late Night: "I Can't Get Started" - YouTube

I was perusing tables of contents and noticed in the Library of America’s anthology of twentieth-century poetry, lyricists are included, and Ira Gershwin’s lyrics to the song “I Can’t Get Started” is one of the entries. (Vernon Duke wrote the music.)  Coincidently, my friend Neil Novello and I had been sharing some video clips and comments featuring Sammy Davis, Jr., and one of the clips is Sammy singing “I Can’t Get Started,” from David Letterman’s show in 1989. Click here. Wow.

 

Please visit my website at www.randystark.com and my page at Write Up The Road.

A Poem by Gwendolyn Brooks

 

my dreams, my works, must wait till after hell

I hold my honey and I store my bread

In little jars and cabinets of my will.

I label clearly, and each latch and lid

I bid, Be firm till I return from hell.

I am very hungry. I am incomplete.

And none can give me any word but Wait,

The puny light. I keep my eyes pointed in;

Hoping that, when the devil days of my hurt

Drag out to their last dregs and I resume

On such legs as are left me, in such heart

As I can manage, remember to go home,

My taste will not have turned insensitive

To honey and bread old purity could love. 

Gwendolyn Brooks