Dead

Looking for something to lift my

corona-dampened spirits on Easter

I rooted thru my box of DVDs

and started laffing the instant I spotted

It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World,

laffing at my memory of Jerry Lewis

grinning maniacally as he swerves

in the street in front of police headquarters

and flattens Spencer Tracy's hat

while Tracy (Capt. Culpeper)

leans out the open window

through which he had tossed the hat,

aiming for the hat rack next to the window--

[pause here to finish laffing]

laffing at my memory of Jonathan Winters's

rampage in a brand new service station,

bringing down the building and knocking

its two uniformed owners senseless

before driving away in their wrecker.

I laffed as my eyes caressed

the DVD’s mad mad mad mad cover,

with its cast of 15—many of them

comics—peering madly at me

through and around the title’s letters

while leafy green silver certificates

rain down on everyone,

and I laffed remembering that scene,

and while I was laffing, eager

to pop the movie into my laptop,

a wee harmless question

bubbled up through my excitement,

and I Googled up the movie’s Wiki site

and, losing the fight to keep from

clicking the next link, I learned

the one thing I didn’t really need to know,

want to know--

I had already assumed the lion

in the MGM logo atop the cover was dead,

which didn’t bother me, but when I saw Mickey Rooney

had died April 6 six years ago I knew

I soon would be laffing at the antics

of an all-dead cast, which, I had little doubt,

would lift my weary spirits,

nonetheless.

                                                                                                                        m.d. paust