A Fat Man on Ice Skates

Figure Skating

I’m going to take up figure skating

Don’t start laughing, please stop hating

So I’m pushing sixty, no big deal

I’ll be so graceful, dip and wheel

I’ll pirouette and not just once, but thrice

I’ll look so graceful skating their

Ample wind blowing through sparse hair

Spandex and sequins adorn my dowdy frame

I’m spavin and you know of course,

If you have ever owned a horse

That it’s a look that proves a broken frame

So one eye’s bad, my teeth look sad

But out there on two shiny blades of steel

No one will notice my beer paunch

Or the rolls of flab upon my haunches

My daring will disguise my frailties

A drum roll will precede the feat

Of grandeur and folks will stand on their seats

To get a look at the finale of my act

Skating at fantastically breakneck speed

I’ll circle the rink to perform my deed

As faster and faster and faster I go

My sparkling blades cut through the ice

My snowy wake goes into the balcony

I’m spiraling into the center now

My red hot skates, an icy plow

As faster and faster I dizzily spin around

I’ve become a blur of blinding light

The spotlight seems dim i

I’m finally in the exact middle

Bassoons boom violas fiddle

A crescendo is building a climax is nigh

We’re all one, the band, the crowd and I

The cheering is deafening the roof begins to shake

I’m 30 yards from either side, on solid ice

And yet they try to touch me with their applause

Able to restrain the moment no more

I signal my people and with a roar

A cannon shoots confetti all around

The lights go off for a nano sec

The huge crowd gasps and strains their necks

For I’m no longer in the center of the rink

But in the center of the arena now strewn with roses

Lies a silhouette in an angel pose

But my body isn’t there, I’ve disappeared

I couldn’t have gone to the side in that time

The ice wouldn’t yield it’s solidly sealed

No hoist was on the beams o’erhead

So, you may wonder, as they did too

Just how did I do it, “What did he do?”

They all queried as they left to go out to their cars

Now I’ve got a real confession to make

That whole story above is a terrible fake

I haven’t the faintest clue how to pull it off

But if you ever figure it out my friend

Follow it through to the very end

Cause you know it really seems like a hell of a trick

Though it may take many years and toil and tears

And you know it can really only happen just the once

And I’ll be in the crowd to view it

I’ll stand and cheer and scream for you to do it

And wonder what happened when I see the empty ice

And since I’ll be real old, I’ll come back to the house

And take a comfortable seat in my easy chair

I’ll turn on the tube and watch on the news

17 separate different views of the naked ice

And I’ll wonder where you’ve went.

I’ll smile to myself and say to my wife

That now I’ve finally touched someone’s life

I’ve gotten them to do what couldn’t be done

Because at the end of the day my friend

When the tally’s in and the race is won

The universe is only the size of our hat

So that’s my tale of the skating rink

It might make you laugh if you’ve just had a drink

But I absolutely positively, hopefully, made you THINK!

The End