A guy with the hobby of dressing like a clown
Looked at clown costumes as just the play
Bought the shoes, the silks, and the red and white paints
Children's birthday parties to make a buck
The gladsome his trademark Smile Mouth Chuck
Chuck the dilettante with the grin of gold
His smiling mouth cheered both young and old
In his mail, a guest pass to a clown guild house
Claiming to have an award for him to announce
The house numbers on the card led him to a gate
Pitch night, the bell rung, he'd stand and wait
The pranksters inside with the planned trick
They'd cut off Chuck's clown pants and a donkey tail stick
But they shouldn't do this penny-wise they are crazy
Chuck also went
by the birth title,
Gacy
06-07-2022
© Brian Peter Hodgkinson
Author Archives: Brian Peter Hodgkinson
Clown Hobby
White Man Walking
Taking a seven-mile walk in Kakamega Kenya Outside the dusty sun-beaten town, Strolling strides measure the landscape Gnarled primeval trees grandly stare My happy feet with aimless bliss Beating cadence, teary eyes open, "White man, what news?" bird chatter warns, Bystanders lean in to watch me I float along, invisible, The enigmatic streaming spectacle Miles to go under the hot lamp glare The latitude-zero sun My moisture is evaporating dust Clouds of gray silt canopy the hidden walker A woman digging grins at me toothless Throws her mattock down, cackling Naked boys peek over a bridge Hearing the beating sound of my feet Giggle, splash, "Hey, white man!" Muzungu Muzungu haha Two kilometers is a lifetime study Smörgåsbord of sights for this optic glutton The terrain rolling up to the heavens, Cloudless, for the monsoon, is not yet No categories to name what impacts The sensory consciousness My wheels ache, exhausted from head to toe, But I climb to explore. More African greetings "Hello brother" (Habari ndugu) "Salute" (mzuri), I reply I'm interrogated for my traveling crime, Using the inferior mode of my feet Cross-examined again "Gari yako imeharibika?" (Is your car damaged?) Climbing, sweat calculated steep Burning lungs expand victoriously Greeting giant boulders, Potato-shaped guardians ringing silently, Stretching new distance, Crackling green cane funnel drawing further Brown on one side, Chief Sakwa on the other, Steering between cut green stalkers Village of people like you, like me, Curious, amazed, and bored Most faces in lockstep Never seeing their own utopia I shout to tell, "The environment is gorgeous!" Mocking laughter, pointing calloused fingers, "This white man is poor!" Doesn't drive a Landrover - haha I can't stop. Almost there, Chased and scrutinized for my misdemeanor, But they can't keep up My head of steam the plodding flyer Deep mourning overtakes, Missed seeing half, and I'm almost there. The little graves of blindness, I won't pass this way again. So I turn around 2.5 8.5/10 © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
The Wall Blew Off Typing A Poem
April 16, 2007 - Monday after an afternoon siesta sitting the room write a poem suddenly a gargantuan storm shrieks moans berserk the wind looking out the pane curiosity pine trees dance the herky-jerky side to side - dipping their butts hide from those monster bumps! hide curled in my air leak room as its rage beats against the wall blusterous thumps tweak my dread their angry gloom is way ugly gray crazed squall racers run - horizontal boisterous chasers blasting icy sleets spitting machine-gun drumming bb's beat my glass, i shout Avant, leave! queasy heart hardens cold before this maniac - this evil thing lives! off boards lurching possessed down the avenues - stagger drunken on a wild search, and though unsaid, this foul wintry nympho - riled with a growl the walking dead, hungry whore it died only to revive once mo- re .08 10/10 © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
sun flesh
not a wisp of cloud azure glass transports the sun hairs bramble from heat © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
The Chief
A dog was there, there was more, but a dog, The chief, his name Chief ruled the yard front and back Back was a valley of green, elephant-like leaves green But no elephants, no, not in the valley, but monkeys Some could ride elephant if they were there, but none They just hid behind the ears like elephants, yes, hide Guava like light green golf balls with crunchy seeds birds eat, White out to plant new guava like the golf course in back Golf hotel up the moon cratered road of ditches for cars, The hotel of the malibu stork bone-legging around bald headed Dubbed mr. hairy tufts of hair on the pink skin head eat the dead Peep in the hotel windows, toms looking for dead scraps bones Passion fruit juice after a duet bath, the voyeur mr. hairy Bone-legging begging for a piece, the beef there smells old Milimani home the chief awaits, sleeps on his back, the wicker chair Front porch the dog in wicker legs Up pink weiner show tongue lolls Say hi to the Chief scratch - the belly watch out. 3.6 10/10 © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
rose prick
the two pardners meet and have a fling with sparks fireworks and eruption jing the pink-flesh four-letters are bandied about the soft eyes at you you say oof at me of bed ugly tongues then things go south or not or too talk yak - talk yak is at you speak at me i speak at you people that joined bodies now cannot stand them - the us the we speaking wounds to the body they once joined duet battleships firing cannons broadside and sinking the yesterday four-letter lie lies if the messages true then the joining people the join a clue not true 3.5 8/5 © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
Feather Touch
i stand and stare on this conch-strewn beach the rolling sea the seagulls seem hollow in my thoughts left dry like a sunburned shell i dropped anchor for you in wide waters like a breached galley capturing me with your face yet also held me at bay above board as fellow sailors as an enclose haven so made was i to be the man you sought out handsomely and my furnace for you found no stoke enough to boatswain your masts but you had to depart for the siesta beneath the sea i plan to cross for you aft and not stop searching leeward for you our parting was a saber as your ship set sail our teardrops mingled like blood handkerchief waving that fair winds farewell like the sea quiet or in rage, then your voyage met a nor'easter storm gulping your ship into the maw you did not reach the imagined door my sight grew dim i cannot hear inside my echo you are in the lock the beach breakers still roaring your grin far too permanent to be held in that dark beneath buoying me when feather touching the barnacled hand in mine 4.4 10/10 © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
The Inside Look
home from the marines looking for a job the newspaper help wanted ads looked for near to home a funeral home ad just a few miles down the road light housekeeping some mort assist work piece of cake job hired first day a load of telephone books yellow pages to put in every mortician room going along swimmingly then open a mort room door a naked woman naked as a jay bird more so cranium top removed breasts flopped to the sides with a large y cut innards removed look in her cut ribbed breast cavity empty cave like she died being caught in an elevator an opera singer her dress caught in the door elevator went up she didn't - the strong dress broke her spine and neck first day on the job see a millionaire woman less than poor by the eyes looking into her 4.7 8/5 © Brian Peter Hodgkinson
Freckle Face
from bugs bunny saying whats up doc siesta down rabbit holes to carrot a tan break from the head the musty lock like a dog off the rope and out for fun surprised by the hair you dyed from the rust with purple and frizz green blends curled young the freckles reminding the orange-red of the head to sing of your magnetic face like the sun from sighing at you with the utmost eye dressed in the skirt pleated cream-white you invited me in to voyeur spy gaga with your charis style with kabuki moves so fluid - mystique in the smile the fingers, hands, wrists, and arms arching flex beguiling with hips, the legs, waist, and sway eavesdropping on you better than specs 3.8 10/10 iambic pentameter, rima rhyme, tercets © Brian Peter Hodgkinson rhyme
The River Overlook
the attention of riveted eyes from behind of the spectator's look to behold the ravine in the anchoring you of unzipped it inside the attired to the looking agasp is exposed the supine with the jeans to arouse the observing of river between from behind of the spectator's look iambic pentameter, limerick, tercets, blank verse © Brian Peter Hodgkinson