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HELP! My Guru Died: I’m
Sorry To Hear That |
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There are more Rod sightings these
days than we could shake a stick at. On Tuesday he was said to be on his way to Oregon
with a truckload of bird seed, he has recently been in Taiwan visiting his pirated discs,
this morning we were told he had been at The Price Club in The San Fernando Valley.
Really? We didn’t even realize he’d had his shots.
By now Swami Rami Salami has stepped in so many times in Rod’s absence that all of us
here are on a first name basis with him. Though he prefers the title Mr. Guru or The High,
High Holy One we started referring endearingly to him as Sal. Sal’s a sweetheart and
offers such good advice we thought we’d have him back again because it’s
Saturday & because once again RM has left us in the lurch. Here he is, then, calm cool
and always ready with the collection plate, Swami Sal with more answers to more of
life’s pressing questions. If you need questions or pants pressed write The Guru at webmaster@mckuen.com
On with the wind.
Q : I have been in therapy for my nymphomania now for eight months and I am worried about
my shrink. All this man wants to talk about is sex, from the moment I take my clothes off
its sex, sex, sex. Even when he's giving me the bill! Does this man have a problem?
A : Yes. And it sounds like you’re the perfect answer to it.
Q : Does the person who inventories sheep often fall asleep on the job?
A : It is good to ask such questions.
Q : If mares eat oats, and does eat oats, and little lambs eat ivy, what can do I feet my
dog?
A : I am told Alpo makes food that is equal parts mare, lamb, oats and ivy. Sounds like a
perfectly balanced diet to me.
Q : Which is more natural? Cybersex or phone sex?
A : Cybersex. Sex on the telephone is too impersonal and you have to keep sticking those
quarters in the slot.
Q: All seriousness aside, one of these days you will have to answer the still burning
question "Why did the chicken cross the road?"
A : It is written in the book of Johnny Mercer, "to Accentuate the Positive."
The Porter book goes on to say "It Was Just One Of Those Things". So you see,
there are as many ways to look at road-crossers as there are to cook them.
Q : Swami, do you give medical advice? I am not getting any better despite being in bed
with the doctor for two weeks!
A : Am also a practicing physician, Swami says it is good to change doctors. I can fit you
in around 2:30.
Q : Is it true that if you save the life of someone Chinese you are then responsible for
them.
A : Only for an hour afterward.
Q : Dear Guru, My girlfriends at work don't like me, just because I'm prettier, smarter
and took a couple of their boyfriends away behind their backs. They chipped in and bought
me one of those t-shirts that says "Life's a Bitch -and so am I". I was
insulted! Do you think what the t-shirt says is true?
A : Certainly not. Life isn't ALWAYS a bitch!
Q : This has been bugging since I was a wee lad, when I was first was at school, my mom
sent me to school with a lunch box, and some days she gave me milk it was cold as cold
could be, and then other days she gave me hot chocolate and it was as hot as hot could be,
how did the thermos bottle know what to do?
A : The sands of time will follow you until they are no more. After that the Goose of
Rhama will fly away.
Q: My Tech guy says that the year 2000 is critical and I should be doing something about
it, what is that all about?
A: If you haven’t made reservations in a first class restaurant by now, you will
probably have to chow down at McDonalds on New Years Eve.
Q : I am of Roman Catholic upbringing, but not practicing as of late?
A: Practicing what?
Q : I think my husband has turned prematurely Gay, he only sleeps with his workout buddy
David.
A : This may be a problem even Rogaine cannot cure.
Q : With all the upheaval happening on the world political stage, what is your worst
nightmare?
A : Linda Tripp in a bikini.
Q : Why is it when driving and looking for an address, people turn down the radio?
A : To hear themselves think.
Q : Dear Swami, I am subject to enormous mood swings, Sometimes I am really black, other
days I’m in the pink. Then I am often blue for weeks. I find myself getting green
with envy at people who don’t have this problem, and red in the face with anger,
I’ve even been known to resort to purple prose from time to time. What’s wrong
with me?
A : Dear TV Test Pattern, no wonder you’re only on in the middle of the night.
Q : Surely you would agree that the people have a right to know about the transgressions
of government officials?
A : Yes, but Swami not interested in blow by blow descriptions.
Q: Do Macs ever error and crash?
A : Yes, every crash is do to error. Mostly "error 227", whatever the hell that
is.
Q : I guess you would call me naive, but recently I went to Italy and in a bar one night a
very glamorous older woman with a slit skirt and a see through blouse asked me "how
about a drink" so I said, well, I’m no drinker, but why not"? We had a few
drinks and she said "How about coming to my place for some wild lovemaking" and
I said "Well, I’m no Mel Gibson but I’ll give it a whirl," so we went
to her place and boy, it was pretty hot. The next morning, as I was pulling my trousers on
over my boots, she said hey " how about the money?" And I said, "Well
I’m no gigolo...but I’ll take it!" Do you think I did anything wrong?
A : Screwing with your boots on is a no, no.
Q: I am tired with the deceit and deception my husband Ron engages in concerning his lover
Dave and the many other young men he now seems to be seeing on the side. We fight about it
all the time. I keep wanting to take the gloves off but every time I try, someone sticks
the mouthpiece in and rings the bell for the next round. Last night he came in smelling
like a dirty jock strap full of rancid Roquefort. When I asked him about it he said
"Oh, after the AA meeting this lady invited me over to her house to see some new tile
she had just put down in the kitchen. While I was there her Maltese treed a possum, when I
went to help the poor thing down it sprayed me." Swami, I thought only skunks
sprayed.
A : Have you thought of having your skunk spayed so he won’t spray?
Q : What is your favorite food?
A : Belched asparagus tips [Editors note: After his 6th martini the Swami seemed a little
unsteady. He might have said "bleached" or "botched."]
Q: Tell us your favorite story.
A : Once upon a time . . . and they lived happily ever after.
Q: Abba Dabba Dabba said the monkey to the chimp.
A : The same to you, Buster.
-
from HELP! My Guru Died, 1970, new material, 1998 |
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Gertrude Berg o
Erick Bruhn o Lindsey Bunkingham o Neve Campbell o
Chubby Checker o Eddie Cochran o Pamela Hensley o Tommy Lee o Warner Oland o Emily Post o Madlyn Rhue o Gore Vidal o Jack Wagner o Dave Winfield o Thomas Wolfe |
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May your hand be full
for always, if only with another hand.
Love cannot be said aloud too often or spoken in silence too
many times.
Ideas have in common with the acorn the luxury of starting
small
and taking several lifetimes to become oaks.
Interludes are badly named – even purgatory is a prelude. |
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STILL LIFE WITH HORNE AND SILLS |
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Some butterflies
will not be choked
by chloroform or cyanide.
They soar beyond the corpsman’s net,
the mason jar that lies in wait
to stop them from their jet stream ride.
Why bother living if life means
that means to end is
specimen?
He thought of Hairstreaks under glass
as he sat on a summer evening
listening to Kodaly’s
Summer Evening.
The day had been as gold as gold days get,
sun oozing butterscotch across the garden,
squirrels teaching alphabets to birds
too drunk on one another
to be listening.
Morning glories adjusting
to daylight savings time
and he as tender of a flora / fauna flock
that strayed to roadside
and the neighbor’s yard.
The Summer Evening music nodding
to a close
he tried to choose between Madame Sills
and Madame Horne as ‘doing dishes’
atmosphere.
She of the soaring Verdi
or she of the rising up then dipping down
Rossini.
A compromise. Bubbles for the washing
and the rinsing off, Jackie for the drying
and the stacking.
Some butterflies, he thought,
are cunning,
knowing nylon net as well as silken
spider webbing.
They tread nature’s traps
and never end as threading.
A butterfly saying under its breath
give me a task and I will find
a way to divert
its completion
was his kind of moth, not likely caught,
skewered by White Coat Warden or Black Widow.
For too long
the awful sense of throwing time away
had colored every day and night
he moved through.
And while he wasted time
he knew that Time was wasting him,
enjoying the process.
He got up, went to work, came home,
cooked, gardened,
exercised always,
went to bed, got up, went to work . . .
Did all the etceteras he had done
for always.
In the mirror he saw no one different,
though daily he looked in looking glasses
expecting someone
different
to look back.
A Substantial Other, maybe,
though friends were that one luxury
that had always been beyond his means.
Madame Horne was dropping down the octave.
He dropped down on fours and gave Nobody
twenty.
Men’s muscles move better
when their souls are making
merry music,
having La Horne on one’s side
produced a lighter sweat from push-ups.
He got up light-headed, almost dizzy,
replaced Rossini on the record player
with Stephen Foster,
allowing Marilyn to dream of Jeanie,
beautifully,
expound on hairs vs. fuzz
and take him to the Camptown Races.
The summer was in every way
the way it should have been.
Fat bass cruised the surface of the lake,
minnows in their wake. Geese came back.
The bee balm bloomed, dead-headed,
budded, bloomed again.
Nasturtiums entertained the hummingbirds.
Beverly Sills presented The Pearl Fishers.
He traveled to The City twice to see it.
And every night for him alone,
she and Mr. Victor Herbert told about
the sweetest mystery of you know
what ?
Music was his discipline
far into June and then beyond.
He bought loudspeakers for the garden,
snap shot day lilies at their morning peak
while Sills / Horne lured and lullabyed
the birds and passing traffic.
He knew each butterfly that flew the yard
had only so much time
and yet their numbers seemed to grow.
Like lilies, those with deeper hues
always came out deeper in the season.
August brought the lovely ones, the stars.
Art is calling me, I want to be a Prima Donna . . .
Like Madame Sills and Madame Horne, in song,
they were so in silence.
Some words, like love and death and hope
and immortality and music
are overused by all of us. He stumbled,
only once.
‘Tis the gift to be simple, ‘tis the gift
to be free . . .
Horne ? Sills ? They had long ceased being
separate.
- from "Intervals", 1986 |
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