Frustration

Dorothy Parker


Ms. Parker, like Ogden Nash, is truly a master (mistress?) of the short poem...

If I had a shiny gun
I could have a world of fun
Speeding bullets through the brains
Of the folks that cause me pains.

Or, if I had some poison gas
I could make the moments pass
bumping off the numbers of
people whom I do not love.

But I have no lethal weapon --
Thus does Fate our pleasure step on!
So they still are quick and well
Who should be, by rights, in hell.


Postscript: the final stanza was missing in the version Greg originally found; it was mailed to him by Eleuterio Navarro (eleuterio_navarro@earthspirit.org), who also identified the title of the poem and corrected the wording of the second stanza (poison gas rather than mustard gas). Greg is of the opinion that the full version is rather darker and less humorous than the truncated version, but it would hardly do to leave the poem incomplete.

Greg is also just a little bit embarrassed that it took him four months to make the correction....


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Last modified 23 July 2006 by Greg Roelofs, you betcha.