Bills and Yet More Bills

by Christopher T. George
FreeWrights Peer Review
Honorable Mention, October 2009
Judged by Majid Naficy


Bills arrive uninvited at our doors
predictable as death or, erm, worms.

Bills! Don’t like ‘em! Take
‘em out to lunch–we’ll go Dutch!

Bills on ducks and platypuses,
the joke my grandma told about
Bill Sticker. . . or was it Bill Poster?

Will Bill Hickock, Buffalo Bill,
Bill Clinton. . . the bill you paid
for that Knickerbocker Glory.

Bill Bailey, Bill the Bailiff, the Old Bill,
Portland Bill, Bill the Cat,
Bill Bixby, Bill Blass, Bill Cosby.

Mein Gott! Tot up the bill for that lot!
Rat-a-tat-tat, empty billfold.

Hey, Bills, I’ll take a raincheck, ha ha ha!
Oh, mmmmm. Hi, Mr. Death, Bill Collector.

plastic cut-outs of Elvis. “Blue Hawaii.”
How will I ever pay the bills? Aloha!
Her facility sits south of Loch Raven:

Donna and I on our wedding day in a Rolls
chauffeured round the reservoir, under massive
pines; 40 years before, my family arrived from

the UK: huge gray fish nosed beneath the dam.
Catfish, bottom feeders, corporate clowns.
Deeper depths. What’s the answer–to drive

Mom and myself into the deep of Loch Raven?
Yet, how quick would the end be? I gnaw
my lower lip, pour another whisky, drown.