Hey, half-baker. It’s been a long, mauve time
since you gave your starter dough a kick
in the lavender pants. Leather taut as tick,
your fingers raw, ruddy, and having a time
of it just trying to make a dent this time,
trying to make the supraspinatus click
like clockwork, but cornflower’s the word, lick,
lap, lollygag, and count out cornsilk time.

Pins in the meat of your palm. Take a breather
and see vermillion of the red room spin
-ning from your efforts. Hi-de-ho, the game’s
not up until the sourdough’s light as a feather.
So arise and go shiatsu on it again,
jackhammer till pale-green static sparks flames.

I know it’s gonna come back and bite me,
but here goes: I said it but you were thinking it.

Blue-collar humor’s got shelf life. Wives faking it
are a dime-a-dozen. Ain’t nothing unsightly

between stern media moguls and the nightly
news anchors. If you don’t like it then git

off to France. Your wit ain’t orangutan shit.
So go climb the nearest tree just to spite me.

Of course, the nun who comes and talks you down
won’t show her face, and though she may have been

invested by her parents at some ungodly age
she’s still young and widely enough known

to minister to birds and those who lean
towards heaven for damn good reasons: lust, guns, rage.