R.S. Dunn
Gnomeland Security
So now the gnomes are advocating
Building a 700-mile border fence
To keep the elves out of Gnomeland;
Insisting that elves pop up too often,
Without official papers, of course,
And steal cookie-baking, shoemaking,
And insurance jobs (at Mutual
Of Gnomaha) from proper God-
Fearing native-born gnomes.
Elvish pride, naturally, is stung
By all this. “We only get the jobs
The gnomes don’t want to do.
They don’t bake; they don’t cobble,
They won’t calculate actuarial tables—
They say all that’s beneath them.
So who are we hurting? Tell us that!
All they want to do is stand
On their lawns holding iron talismans
And commune all the live-long day
With their magic mushrooms—
Which, we might add, are likewise
Undocumented. They don’t crack down
On the mushrooms, so why shouldn’t
We elves have the same opportunities?”
The gnomes, in turn, deride what they call
The elves’ “pointy-eared intellectualism,”
And pointedly demand that the elves
Click their heels together three times,
And go back to “Elf Salvador,
Or wherever it is they came from.”
A good and lovely Good Fairy
Once appeared and offered to resolve
The crisis with a wave of her magic wand,
But the Gnomes sent up a banshee wailing.
“We don’t accept wavers, and we hate fairies!”
In calmer moments, the gnomes tend to snicker,
“Wall’s well that ends well.”
But they really aren’t fooling anybody.
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Poet with poems seeks magazine with column inches. Object: parsimony.
I am the editor of the poetry journal, Asbestos; former Editor of Medicinal Purposes Literary Review, the erstwhile host of the Poet to Poet cable television show, and have appeared in such publications as Krax, Imago, Mobius, Art Times; Rattapallax, Nomad’s Choir, Critical Perspectives in Accounting (go figure), and Pegasus. So I know what you’re going through, but it’s probably worse over here.
My full-length collections of poetry include Zen Yentas in Bondage; Playing in Traffic; Horse Latitudes and Baffled in Baloneyville .Additionally, a CD: Sickly Minutes.
“So why ain’t you rich?” I hear you mutter. Your guess is as good as mine.
Editors' note: Robert Dunn died shortly after sending us this poem.