#49
"ready. or. not."
& Muppet fanatics may
question the order of my series, but the way my number-system for my poems
works is based off of bootleg DVDs I bought online from Canada. The order of the episodes on that DVD set is
the way I chose the sequence. It was a strange
coincidence that the first guest star for the third season on my set is of none
other than Helen Reddy! Ready or not,
there in my blushing face was the color red right in Reddy’s name. There too was her first name to work with— I saw Hell in Helen. When I thought
of the number 3, I immediately thought of the Holy Trinity and Dante’s Inferno and so my prose poem went into
three stanzas of nine lines with three words in each to weave a circular sentence.
& My poem depicts a man on
the verge of total narcissism pursuing His American Dream. The end of the piece works itself back to the
beginning. If “He” is in Hell with Santa
& Satan, it is all due to his will, and not to fate, and I thought it funny
that if one abbreviates the phrase “he will” it spells "hell" only with an
apostrophe separating the two halves.
& Helen Reddy is from Australia, nicknamed "Down Under," and down under is just where they say hellfire is. That's how low I go.
& Reddy has more than 3 album covers that are red. She also has songs that feature the color, such as Delta Dawn & Leave Me Alone.
& The Great Fozzie Bear comes in after Scooter’s cold open to say, "Three to get ready!" There are also three whatnot Muppets singing backup for Blue, and three whatnot Muppets in Fozzie's dance number, where all remain composed and unaffected while he keeps falling. Then Rowlf performs Pathétique, which is made of three movements: Grave, Adagio Cantabile, & Rondo.
& Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport is a song about a stockman on his deathbed. (In 1963 Rolf Harris re-recorded it, and it hit #3 on the Billboard Charts). You and Me Against the World, was the first song ever written by Paul Williams and Kenneth Ascher, who both went on to write The Muppet Movie score, including the infamous song, The Rainbow Connection. Helen Reddy changed the song’s original narrative from lovers to a mother & child. I decided to change the song a third time to one against oneself.
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