An Amateur Art Critic Poem by Robert Pettit

One Sunday morning, I went home to visit mom and dad.
My brother was also there, and I showed them what I had.
The first thing I said to father as soon as I saw him,
was that I had four free tickets to the art museum.
His first verbal reaction was the old thing “I don’t know.”
He then said, “Ah, what the hell! Alright, I think I will go.”

Getting the old man in the place proved to be a tough sale.
The one thing he seemed interested in was a female.
This young attractive blonde woman was someone father eyed.
We discovered shortly that this cute thing was our tour guide.

The old man showed displeasure after passing through the door.
He displayed constant disapproval while he walked the floor.
Dad would make deprecating comments of all he observed.
Witnessing this, the tour guide seemed to be quite perturbed.

As everyone was led down the abstract art corridor,
my dear dad spewed out obnoxious comments a little more.
He made remarks about a work by Pablo Picasso.
This resulted in an embarrassing scenario.
He then emitted some words that sounded quite imprudent:
“Might this be a painting rendered by a preschool student? ”

While standing and observing at a Jackson Pollock work
My old man displayed another example of a quirk.
He was heard to ask with loud interrogative candor:
“Is this from an accident at a Sherwin-Williams store? “

His next words transpired into negative vicissitudes:
“Tell me, where do you display all of your paintings of nudes? ”
The tour guide appeared to have had enough of my old man.
After all, she took more than the average person can.

Immediately following my father’s last retort,
The tour guide announced she would cut the exhibition short.
She told me, “Please take him out of here as soon as you can!
I really feel sorry for you if he is your old man!
If you ever want to avoid some abasement and shame,
any Sunday afternoon, take him to see a ballgame.”