Mad Frogs and Garbage Men by Rob S. Rice

Mad Frogs and Garbagemen
By Rob S. Rice

Only mad frogs and garbagemen go in the noonday sun.
Joined only by the rest of us who need to get things done.
Those empty-eyeballed sorts in shorts who wander in a daze,
Half-walking and half-swimming through the moisture laden haze.

To wake up in the mornings when you're swimming in your sheets
Is not so quite as wretched as the kind of day that greets
The early riser with the news "You ain't seen nothing yet!
Today we'll all discover just how rotten it can get!"

When the drinking fountain water starts to come out nearly boiled,
A seat close to a window leaves one half of you near-broiled,
When fish outside the window are sharing the trees with birds,
You know the weather for today will leave you whey and curds.

The waterfall of perspiration trickling down your sides,
That leaves a dark enormous stain no pattern can disguise
Upon your shirt, is joined by grease oozing down from your hair
And sweat in other places (though I don't dare mention where).

To hear the grinning weather-boob shout "it's ninety-eight!
Both heat and the humidity, now isn't that just great?"
Sets blood to boiling faster and your brain matter to fissioning.
You want to throw the moron in his building's air conditioning.

To watch the pigeons falling and dissolving on the stair,
To fill a glass with water just by pouring in some air,
To watch a rhododendron's leaves flag-signal "S.O.S"
Is not a shred of comfort when you've got your own distress.

I stepped inside the shower and my bar of soap was gone
Before I realized I hadn't turned the water on.
I found my towel sopping wet before I'd even used it.
An octopus fell on my head (the weather had confused it).

I ate my calimari with a calm and measured air.
I squee-geed off my glasses while I held off my despair.
I hoped to find a maxim, and I think that I've found one:
Only mad frogs and garbagemen go in the noonday sun.