I’ve never forgiven Maurice Ravel for having written Bolero,
Or almost everything else he wrote.
I think he should have been a barber or a pig farmer
Or maybe a writer of those inane little verses
For Hallmarque cardes (or whatever their French equivalent would be)
He could have sung in a cabaret in a thin falsetto,
Whatever.
As long as he gave up music before he wrote some of those dreadful things.
I’ve never forgiven twenty-seven for not being a prime number
Like its dutiful peers seven and seventeen
Or even thirty-seven, forty-seven and lots of others.
I wonder why those in charge
Of assigning prime numbers
Allowed this to escape their attention.
I’ve never forgiven Wagner for not being Italian
Instead of writing in that bilious language of raspy grunts
And spittle and throaty gurgles
He would have used a tongue so smooth and fluid
That it makes its own sweet cadence.
For that matter, I’ve never forgiven my parents for not being Italian
Sure, they tried, but not hard enough.
I could have been named
Francisco Guilberto da Baltimore (this last pronounced
Bahl tee MAW reh.)
Then, like my would-be-fellow-countrymen,
Gee-you-SEP-pey Vee-AIR-day,
Lay-uh-NAR-doe Dah-VIN-chee
And plenty others I could name,
My name alone may easily have led me to great fame
And wealth
And public recognition
And lovely olive-skinned doting young ladies
Anxious just to utter my name,
All this without any effort on my part.
I’ve never forgiven the slackards who,
When allotting days to months,
Decided that twenty-eight would satisfy February
At least three years out of four.
So, thanks to them,
Only once in my lengthy wage-earning days
And beyond
Did I receive three paydays in that month.
It’s fifty-six years between such happy events.
I could be thankful for the extra pay but I’m not.
I think of the extra paydays that should have been mine
Had they made the effort.
So there you have my list.
I could have added plenty of others,
But I didn’t.
I don’t want to sound like a sourpuss.