Missus Lucas' Overdue Library Book Blues

Well, I looked on the computer;

          so many books are overdue.

Yeah I looked at that computer;

          so many books are overdue.

Don’t know why kids won’t return ‘em.

Makes a white-haired old lady blue

Now, most students hate most textbooks

          and can’t wait to turn them in.

Most students hate their textbooks;

          cannot wait to turn them in

Gotta wonder why they’re missin’—

          or whose closet they might be in

I can understand with novels.

          Some books get in and grab you deep.

Yeah I get it with some novels;

          books that take and grab you deep.

It can pain you to remember:

          Yours to borrow; not to keep.

Won’t you help me end my sorrow,

          won’t you find that missing book?

Please, please help me end my sorrow,

          and bring back that missing book.

I’ll bet that you can find it

          if you just go home and look.

                   I’m short copies of  The Good Earth

                   and Fahrenheit Four-Five-One.

                   Scarlet Letter, Go Ask Alice,

                   Grapes of Wrath and Native Son!

Oh you know it grieves me, Baby;

          so many books are overdue

But I know you’ll help me Darlin’—

          make sure those books are not checked out to you

Your books won’t be overdue!

17 January 2014

No Escape

God saw you chopping off small feet and hands.
God watched you snatch the daughter from her bed.
God heard your incoherent sex demands.
God watched you speed away as the son bled.
God noticed as you calmly aimed your gun
   and shot the pregnant woman in the back.
God noticed there were some too small to run
   when you set off your suicide attack.
God knows you kept the boy and drowned the girl.
God knows how many teens you've thrown away.
God knows you keep girl-whores in your drug world.
God knows child-workers did not eat today.
And yet with all these things God knows you do,
the empty cross insists God loves you, too.

L.B. R. Lucas
5 March 2002

On Blessings Counted

Top of my list can only be
that strong, sweet soul who married me.
No wine-and-fire romance for us,
not with five sons who fight and fuss.
His show of love takes different shapes:
raspberry hats on tall green grapes;
in nightly checks on boys in beds;
in noting halos round their heads;
in waking me with coffee hot--
the world is changed but we are not.
As we trip over building blocks,
and launder piles of smelly socks,
he'll make me laugh with some sly line,
and I thank God that he is mine.

L.B.R. Lucas
October 2001

What Strength There Is

What strength there is in learning how to weep;
in public yet, for all the world to see.
Though lives are lost, our freedom we will keep.

While others dig their loved ones from that heap,
the poster-bearers moan in common plea.
What strength there is in learning how to weep.

The Bastards proved a hatred that runs deep.
They gored us all--on national T.V.
Though lives are lost, our freedom we will keep.

Our tempers flare, our children cannot sleep,
but cynics and psychologists agree
what strength there is in learning how to weep.

And so, to arms. They've sown what they shall reap.
We Infidels will find our enemy;
though lives are lost, our freedom we will keep.

We're on our way, by jet, by ship, by Jeep.
Make no mistake, we stand in unity.
What strength there is in learning how to weep.
Though lives are lost, our freedom we will keep.

L.B.R. Lucas
15 September 2001