Just a bit to my shame
I admit I could name
For obscurity’s season-end showing
The jump-the-gun wag
Who remembers the gag
And stops me before I get going.
But at the same time,
I won’t, give you a dime–
In fact, my contempt’s undiminished–
For the heckling-type bloke
Who says “I’ve heard the joke”
A second before I have finished.
And yet I can’t learn–
I keep trying to turn
Up some chap whose folks brought him up rightly,
Who, if he can’t guffaw
At my every old saw,
At, least keeps his lip buttoned tightly!
by Ray Romine Tuesday, June 9, 1953
