I Plagiarize Myself

Heavens, here it is, Wicked Wednesday again, and me without a thing to wear.  I've been so plunged into the abyss that Jean-Paul Sartre so succinctly summed up in his memorable phrase, "Hell is bathroom renovations," that I quite forgot I was going to have to be wicked today.

Fortunately, it is also Hans Christian Andersen's birthday.  I shall therefore offer my Gentle Readers an excerpt from one of my Perverse Verses, and I am sure that the H.C. Andersen estate would agree that what I have done to that poor departed fabulist is quite wicked enough.  (You want to know why I riff on nineteenth century texts?  The authors have been dead so long that nobody is gonna sue.)

Here, with no further ado, are the introductory stanzas of:



The Emperor’s New Clothes


It isn’t all too often that we find
a bold and honest soul who’ll speak his mind.
From early on, we’re brought up to dissemble.
Our fondest secret hope is to resemble
closely, in action, status, garb and speech
whoever sets the current fashion.  Each
so-called individual aspires
to ape his betters – disregard deniers! -
to be a cookie-cutter-type reissue
(albeit snipped from slightly better tissue)
of anyone the hoi polloi admires.
‘Tis musing on this matter that inspires
a story, writ by the immortal pen
of fairytaler H.C. Andersen.

So we suggest you pay him careful heed
the next time you’ve become convinced you need
to allocate more than your monthly wages
for worn-out jeans that someone else “pre-ages.”
(In other words, there are already rips
across the seat, and Jackson Pollock drips
applied by some untalented young  punk,
thus rendering them artsy-fartsy junk.)
For this year’s rage is next year’s fashion folly –
passé as any gown from Hello, Dolly!
And mutton dressed as lamb can never please
the most discriminating palates.  These
things are well to bear in mind; but even worse
than emulating silly modes, the curse
of parroting another dimwit’s thought,
convinced, the while, it is your own, has caught
many unwary undergrads (we will not
speak of their professors here.) The hypnot-
ic impact of a catchy, stupid phrase
is certain to become the latest craze.
Both on and off the campus, we can find,
in madding crowds, not one who has a mind
to call his own – they glibly holler “Doh!”
“Got milk, dude?” “Where’s the beef?” or simply “Yo.”
But - as said Lenny Bruce, my favorite tipster -
“Nothing is sadder than an aging hipster.’”

The sovereign of this eponymous
short classic is, in fact, anonymous –
the trope of titled clotheshorse always fits
at least a few royals in the headlines.  It’s
pleasant to recall First Ladies whose
besetting passion was for buying shoes.
Or there’s the late, lamented Princess Di -
“Shop till you drop!” her lifelong battle cry.
“I’m thick as any plank,” she liked to boast,
“but I look ravishing in shades of toast.”

There's quite a lot more, but remember, I am hoping to sell at least a copy or two, and so, like Andrew Marvell's mistress, I am forced - entirely against my otherwise honest and forthright nature - to be coy .  (Would you buy a used poem from this woman?)