Beetlebung and Kettlehole--April Poems

Tax Jam

No sweetener in this one
and numbers grovel, quizzical lines pop up,
signs point to additions, equaling
nothing I can grasp, and accountant’s pen,
without consulting any instruction manual,
doodles, drawing traces, right or wrong,
as he exposes last year’s past on paper
for vampiric voyeurs.

I wait with spoon in hand to stir the pot,
but fruits fall apart and jam boils over.

If I could--instead--I would play
the lyre and sing to IRS, setting what I own
in words and tunes, but that wouldn’t make
much of an impression since my offering
would not be the IRS jam. So, by now,
I’m taxed all right out of my mind.
Still, I muse, someday, I may envy the gallantry
of a knight putting a levy on those who squeeze
what little’s left, out of me.


prompt: your take on taxation this year