The Broken Down Mind of Joan Maurer: Poems & Monologues from Ashby Ponds

By Joan Maurer

IF YOU CAN HEAR ME, YOU MIGHT WANT TO SAY: "HI JOAN!"

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jan 29, 2014
• ISBN: 9781493148424

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Joan Maurer.

ISBN:   Softcover   978-1-4931-4841-7

   eBook   978-1-4931-4842-4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted

in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,

without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 01/24/2014

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris LLC

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

541835

CONTENTS

Preface

POEMS

The Mouse Before Christmas

The Cat And Mouse Game

Yesterday Or It Ain’t Over ’Til It’s Over!

Santa Claus Is Coming To Ashby Ponds

Dear Santa

Keep This To Yourself (A Holiday Toast)

My Valentines Day Massacre

September Song 2

My September Song

The Weight Watcher

Ou Est La Crepe Suzette?

Revelation

MONOLOGUES

Hi There!

Welcome To Ashby Ponds!

Fond Memories

Can You Hear Me Now?

Do You Remember?

Faqs (Frequently Asked Questions)

Older Than Springtime?

They Don’t Write Them Like That Any More!

PREFACE

For the past five years I’ve lived at Ashby Ponds, a very nice retirement community in Northern Virginia. At present we number more than 700 residents, and we’re growing all the time, with new neighborhoods under construction and the unfinished apartments in them already reserved. Here I sing tenor in the Songbirds choral group. We give about eight concerts a year for our fellow residents and friends. The choral director has been kind enough to let me read one of my own poems or monologues at each of these concerts and the audiences have been kind enough to laugh when I’m trying to be funny and to nod sympathetically when I’m trying to be serious. Many people have asked me for copies of these poems and monologues, so I’ve decided to put some of them together in a little book which I’ve titled (with apologies to Bob Newhart): The Broken Down Mind of Joan Maurer. I’d like to dedicate it to the residents and staff of Ashby Ponds who make it fun to grow old.

Enjoy—

Joan

THE MOUSE

BEFORE CHRISTMAS

’Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house

Not a creature was stirring except for one little mouse.

The party was over, the kids had all gone,

I had bolted the door and then turned with a yawn

When I suddenly saw him-sitting there on a chair

And staring at me with a self-assured air.

I gasped and I shuddered and started to shriek

And he answered me back with a small mousy squeak.

I was shaking and quaking—but the mouse was just bored.

Then I suddenly thought of that dangling pull cord.

I ran to the cord and pulled it real hard

Summoning up a security guard.

It was twenty past twelve by the grandfather clock,

When I opened the door at the sound of his knock.

Do you have a problem? the guard wanted to know,

And I said, ‘‘Yes, I do, indeed, indeed that is so!

There’s a mouse in the house over there on the chair!"

But, of course, when he looked the mouse wasn’t there.

We searched and we searched, all