My wife Chris McKinley-Dahl’s mixed-media, soft sculpture Comedy and Tragedy won Honorable Mention in the juried Holland Friends of Art Spring Art Show at the Holland Area Arts Council.  The show runs through May.

Comedy and Tragedy

Springtime easters buds
enigmatically and
sings viriditas.

*Viriditas: greening

“O most honored Greening Force,
You who roots in the Sun;
You who lights up, in shining serenity,
within a wheel
that earthly excellence fails to comprehend.
You are enfolded
in the weaving of divine mysteries.
You redden like the dawn
and you burn: flame of the Sun.”
— Hildegard von Bingen, Causae et Curae

When he thinks back to his high school days,
The image in his mind is that he is completely up to date
With things as they are as of late.
But when he sees photos of things of those days
It leaves him completely in a daze.
Things in those days seem like a haze.
Everything is completely out of date:
Clothes are out of date,
Buildings are out of date,
Hair styles are out of date,
Cars are out of date,
Furniture is out of date,
High school dates are out of date,
Photos of him show him out of date,
And not at all as they are as of late.
He wonders if he needs to be up to date
With all the things that are up to date
As of late.
Looking in the mirror,
He sees he needs to go shopping,
So up to date
He will appear.

He stopped along the jog and
stepped into a porta potty
in the park. When he looked
into the hole he saw a metal
snuff-box sitting on toilet
tissue soaking in water
deep blue. What to do when
he was through tapping a
kidney? He saw a sanitizer
dispenser and tried it. It dis-
pensed. It was then he knew
his mission  — reach down,
pick up the tin, drop it on the
side of the commode, rub
hands with sanitizer, pick up
tin with toilet tissue, drop
tin in the garbage can next
to the porta-potty, return to
porta potty for more sanitizer,
resume jog. Mission accomp-
lished; the theme music from
the TV show Mission Impossible
rang in his ears as he picked
up the pace.

My late wife’s family
never spoke of death
as if by not speaking
of it, it wouldn’t happen.

My father-in-law, at sixty-
nine, died first, dropping
dead of a heart attack.

My wife went next, dying
in a day at forty-nine, of
a subarachnoid hemorrhage.

Then came my mother-in-law
who died of old age at ninety-
eight.

And here I am speaking
of the dead.

who is going to arrest the top law enforcement officer
of the united states for breaking the law by lying to
congress? who is going to stop the attorney general
from arresting and jailing members of the justice
department for having investigated (“spying”) connect-
ions between the president and russia related to the
presidential election of 2016? who is going to enforce
the impeachment of the president of the united states
assuming he could even be impeached in the first place
given the passivity of the republicans in the senate?
who is going to get the republicans in the senate to
take action against the president of the united states
so he could be removed from office for the sake of the
republic? who is going to stop the international crime
syndicate (of whom the presidents of the united states
and russia are members) from bullying and strong-arming
its way through the world? who is going to do anything
except speak about all of it in higher and higher deci-
bels of alarm knowing the united states is under attack
by the regime headed by the president of the united
states? who is going to get out the vote to end this
presidency and if this president is voted out of office,
who is going to make sure he leaves office? who?

The carnival is in town.
All the junk food trucks, too
— elephant ears, fat balls
Italian beef and sausage
from which to choose.
At the sausage I did gaze
and I was taken back in time
to my adolescent days
and a sausage sandwich
for a buck and a dime —
no onions please,
but don’t forget the peppers
and that delicious bun to squeeze.
And so, I caved
and bought the Italian
sausage sandwich I craved.
Lord, have mercy, how time flies.
The sandwich was five bucks
without fries.
They held the onion,
loaded it with peppers.
I watched the juice soak through the bun.
I turned and asked my wife
if she wanted one.
“No, dear,
you can have all the fun.”
I took a bite
and to my high school time
I had a flight.
“Hey, kid, that will be a buck and a dime.”
A little short on change,
I asked, “Hey, buddy, could you spare a dime?”
My buddy said, “Just this one time.”
So, I got the dime
and they cut the sandwich in two.
I said to my buddy,
“Half’s for you.”
He didn’t hesitate
in taking that sausage with peppers, too
and said,
“You can have a dime anytime.”
Just then it started to rain
and my wife tapped at my trench.
“Let’s go before you’ll
be looking for a root beer float
and we get drenched.”

Oligarchy, plutocracy and kleptocracy,
Ah, that’s the life for me —
rule by the few,
rule by the rich,
rule by those who steal,
what a wonderful life that would be.
Yes, I’m one of the sixty-million strong
who you all say got it wrong,
but an oligarch, plutocrat and kleptocrat
soon I will be.
The Donald promised me.
I am just one misfortune
from having my own fortune.
I’m gonna be one of them one percenters
with bags of money on each knee;
Just you wait and see.
Again I’ll vote for him
before a short stay in pauper’s prison.
Yes, I’m one of the sixty-million strong,
but, I’m beginning to wonder;
did we get something wrong?

The Attorney General, the high-
est law enforcement officer in
the country, not only didn’t
tell the truth

but responded to the question,
“How low can you go?” with
“What, me worry?”

“When we’ve been there ten thousand years
Bright shining as the sun,
We’ve no less days to sing God’s praise
Than when we’ve first begun.”

Oops, we’re not there.

No grace here.

Wrong song, wrong 10,000.
That’s 10,000 lies plus the
general’s one is the song sung.

Did he get that straight from
the crooked Oval office?
“That’s all, folks.”

Well, try to stand up against
an injured, decorated, war hero
Marine whose reputation is
at stake.

It’s Happy Hour. Integrity, anyone?

The truth, by the book, will come
out in spite of your “obstruction of
justice,” General.

Th, th, th, that ain’t all,
folks.