If A Bird Just Can'T Sing The Blues Poem by Patti Masterman

if a bird just can't sing the Blues
what can you do?
buy him some lessons
with a mezzo-soprano,
or lower his beak
to an alto contralto?
take him to doctors;
buy him a shrink
but don't give him time
to just sit and think?
buy him a whore,
and a liter of Beam-
then tell him that things
are not what they seem;
give him good food
and lots of attention;
then rent him out
to the woodpecker's convention.

(and if all else fail,
he can guard your corn
and play his nostrils
like an old French horn)