The A-1 China Super Buffet lacks knives
And we are no longer the leader of the free world.
I’m not sure what disturbs me more.
I imagine an incident at the buffet,
A butter knife attack long ago,
And the owners swearing off the utensil,
Or a loutish mule at the G-7 Summit
Bucking in invective, stamping his wingtips,
Flaring his nose, and bolting for Singapore.
Certainly, the butter knife attack I made up—
It’s probably a cultural thing, allowing forks
Instead of chopsticks is as far as they’ll bend—
But the leader of the former leader
Of the free world is somehow real
And we can’t take his knives away, not yet,
And he’ll be at the feed trough braying for his steak
Well-done, gums exposed, totally uninformed
That mules usually eat hay.
Harold Oberman is a lawyer and poet working and writing in Charleston, S.C. Most Mondays he can be found at the A-1 China Super Buffet.