We’re at a stand called BOB MARLEY’S HOUSE OF SONGS. There’s a list of songs for sale on the wall behind the counter: LOVE SONGS, SWAN SONGS, THEME SONGS, NOVELTY SONGS, etc, but all the songs — except for REDEMPTION SONGS (which sell for $1.99) — are labeled SOLD OUT. A customer complains to proprietor Bob: “All you ever have is Redemption Songs!”
Yesterday I published a Thanksgiving-themed travesty of W.B. Yeats’ “The Second Coming.” That’s, like, the definition of niche, but I was gratified to get a nice response from members of that niche. It occurs to me that this is the kind of thing that idealistic English Teachers show to their students to prove that Poetry can be fun. (Ms. Palma had my class read a response to Matthew Arnold’s “Dover Beach” called “Dover Bitch.”) So if any of you know any idealistic English teachers, please share it with them. Link is here.
Marni Walker kindly requests “More Sherlock Holmes,” and I promise I’ll get back to my Young Holmes chapters, but I’m sticking a pin in them for a little bit; I showed the 25k words I’ve written so far to the Publishing Establishment, and the Publishing Establishment shrugged — Sherlock Holmes isn’t in this season. But he’ll be back, and so will I, and I’ll finish the book.
Here’s a guest cartoon, conceived, written, and drawn by Dan McCoy:
Dan, like me, is a sucker for a lyric-based punchline. He’s such a good writer (and podcast host) that I always feel like it’s unfair that he can draw so well, too. Thanks, Dan.
The rest of you: get out there and draw.