A Schoolboy’s Folly

by Joshua C. Frank (April 2024)

A Schoolboy’s Folly

Another girl, another crush
To cast in every thought of mine.
I’ve turned into a romance lush:
Another girl, another crush.
I love the high, I love the rush!
She harshed my love?  No need to pine:
Another girl, another crush
To cast in every thought of mine.

Bonnie

I met her jogging in the city park;
I knew I’d seen her somewhere, yes, but where?
“It’s me,” she said, “It’s Bonnie! Bonnie Clark!”
I said, “It is you!” as I stopped to stare.
She’d been my college buddy, more or less
Accepted as an honorary man,
But now she had long hair, a purse, a dress,
A girlish voice; my wanting her began,
For women’s ways no longer made her scoff.
I asked if she was free to dine at eight
And hoped my boldness wouldn’t chase her off.
She smiled wide and answered, “It’s a date!”
For her, true womanhood for years had tarried,
But late that year, we took our vows and married.

Make-Believe Sorrows

Based on the Confessions of St. Augustine, Book III, Chapter 2

Why, God, does man desire to be grieving
At tragic scenes of woes he couldn’t bear?
The viewer’s called to sorrow, not relieving
The misery that isn’t really there.
He walks away, unless he’s moved to tears
And stares transfixed, and weeps for joy, and cheers.

What kind of wretched madness is this passion?
Do we who sit at plays have hearts of cold?
For how could one who truly has compassion
Go out in search of suffering to behold?
We learn to grieve with them and nothing more
When people in real pain come to our door.

Hamelin Revisited

As children, we heard of the Pied Piper’s tricks
In the Year of Our Lord thirteen-seventy-six,
Of his magical flute’s most insidious pillage
Of luring the children away from the village.
The parents, alas, couldn’t counter the magic;
No city since Sodom had an ending more tragic!
Yet, were the tale modern instead of medieval,
Would we still call the Piper a man of great evil?
We’d insist that it’s wrong that the parents lamented,
Because all the village’s children consented.

Table of Contents

Joshua C. Frank works in the field of statistics and lives in the American Heartland.  His poetry has been published in The Society of Classical Poets, Snakeskin, The Lyric, Sparks of Calliope, Westward Quarterly, Atop the Cliffs, Our Day’s Encounter, The Creativity Webzine, Verse Virtual, and The Asahi Haikuist Network, and his short fiction has been published in Nanoism and The Creativity Webzine. His website is here.

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