Unrefined Poem by David Alpaugh

I’m vulgar.
If I were wheat I’d be bulgar.

If I were a bird I’d be Crow.
If I were absurd I’d be Pozzo.

If I were a Norse God I’d be Loki.
If I were a dance, the hokey-pokey.

Slip me the keys to the kingdom
and I’ll let the riffraff come—
the leper, the beggar, the poet, and the bum.

If I were on the surface, I’d be scum.

If I could put on strings, I’d be a ukulele
and if Segovia came, I’d say, “Sorry—
only Arthur Godfrey can strum me.”

Things gross in nature become me.

I am the chaff which the wind driveth away.
I am the human laugh of the feral child at play.

I’m the only man at the brothel
who still goes upstairs with Olga!

Even my rhyme is half-assed.
I’m vulgar.