Jingle

       three demisonnets

1955

The white boy with the tousled hair
on the TV won’t eat his cereal
he needs a jingle to change his mind
or maybe a cartoon character.
I’m drinking it all in like my dad with
his cold Stroh’s. At five I’m unaware
I’m an idiot. But television knows.

1968

I grew up in the days of angry flags
we carried in our mobs, when guitar riffs
and fatuous lyrics stuck to me like the leeches
the less fortunate were picking off their uniforms.
By burning my apron strings I learned
that if I screamed an idea loud enough
I could convince myself of anything.

2024

Lately a string of geezers my age
have been hawking a pill that will clear
the fog in my memory. I want to tell them
they needs a good jingle and a cartoon
character. I would suggest the mayfly,
an insect that emerges in its adult stage
to couple and die in the same day.

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Tom Barlow is a widely published author of poems, short stories and novels. He writes because conversation requires give and take, and he’s always thought of himself as more of a giver.