On Growing Up Poor

It stinks to grow up poor.
All the children in our family had to share the same jacuzzi.
But Daddy always kept food on the table..
We begged him to let us put it in the fridge.
But he was sort of nuts.

The Life and Death of George Washington Jones

Once upon a time,
Myrtle and Ontario Jones
Named their only son George Washington Jones

They named him that
Because they were fans of America
And at least George Washington Jones had a better fate than his sister
Who they named George Washington Jones

The idea of naming the children both
George Washington Jones
Was given to Myrtle and Ontario
by an old family friend named Mr. Worm
Who said children should be named after great people
That they might become great people themselves
And thus George Washington Jones and George Washington Jones
Both having great names
Were expected to do great things.

Anyway,
George Washington Jones (the brother)
Loved his sister (George Washington Jones)
And swore to protect her from all danger
Until such time as she would choose a husband
Who could then himself protect George Washington Jones from all danger

Unfortunately, there was one danger
That George Washington Jones could not protect George Washington Jones from
And that was the danger that she would choose a bad apple to wed
Specifically one Lee McGillis Lincoln
Who married women for their money
And then carved them up with one of those things you use to carve pumpkins
(I believe the word I'm looking for is knife)
And left their bodies to rot deep in the deepest well in North Virginian
(Which is north of South Virginia, but strangely south of West Virginia, but at least the people don't smell like the people in West Virginia)

Anyway
Lee McGillis Lincoln wooed George Washington Jones
Introduced to her by Mr. Worm

He wooed her
With his European sense of finery and attractive snobbishness
Much to the dismay of George Washington Jones (the brother)
But unfortunately this was the early 1800s, or maybe the late 1900s
And women were emancipated and could choose their own husbands
Thus paving the way for predatory bluebeards like Lee McGillis Lincoln
Who prayed upon young strumpets like George Wahsington Jones

Myrtle and Ontario Jones (Myrtle was the mother, in case you were wondering about the sex identity of the parents. I know I was.)

Anyway, Myrtle and Ontario Jones, the parents
Approved of the match between Lee McGillis Lincoln and George Washington Jones
And also, incidentally, approved of matches in general, due to their general usefullness in lighting stuff such as cigarettes, pipes, candles, bonfires, etc.

So Lee McGillis Lincoln and George Washington Jones
were wed,
And Lee looked with more lustful eyes upon the giant dowry then he did upon his fair young bride
And cackled like a mad dog, like a mad dog who has somehow developed by some form of micro-evolution the ability to cackle

He cakled
Whereupon, the rest of the wedding party was nonplussed by Lee's behavior
Considering the fact you don't usually cackle-like-a-mad-dog-who-has-somehow-developed-by-some-form-of-micro-evolution-the-ability-to-cackle on your wedding day
But Lee did

Hastening to their bridal chamber
Deep in the woods of North Virginia,
Lee McGillis Lincoln sharpened his pumpkin carving thing
And poured gin between his gold and copper teeth
Whilst upstairs in the bedroom George Washington Jones changed into something more comfortable

(a corset, which was quite a comfortable corset, actually, because it had been designed for a one hundred and twelve pound woman, and George Washington Jones was a healthy one hundred and forty)

Meanwhile
George Washington Jones
Having discovered Lee McGillis Lincoln's identity as the killer who killed women for their money
In a journel page he found that accidently dropped from Lee's journel
That said "I am a killer who kills women for their money"
Was rushing across the country from Missouri where the wedding had taken place
Towards North Virginia where the murder of George Washington Jones was about to take place
If George Washington Jones could not prevent the occurence of said murder

Anyway,
he pushed his horse as fast as his horse could go,
but finally the horse collapsed,
And George Washington Jones just said "the heck with it"
And got a taxi

Meanwhile,
the glimmering pumpkin carving thing in his hand
Lee McGillis Lincoln went upstairs
Where George Washington Jones awaited what she thought would be a delightful evening
Of playing checkers
(George Washington Jones had never been informed on certain matters pertaining to matrimony)(by certain matters of matrimony, i don't know if you knew what i meant by that, but i meant sex)

Anyway,
Suddenly,
The taxi pulls up
And George Washington Jones leaps out
And rushes to the door of the house which contains the bridal chamber
(i was going to switch to present tense but forget it. too confusing.)

He flung open the door and stood there and cried out
"I am George Washington Jones and no evil man will ever hurt my sister, George Washington Jones! Not if I have anything to say about it. And by 'I' I mean this giant musket I am carrying in honor of my namesake, George Washington. Also, notice that I am wearing a wig. Just like George Washington. Only I have the last name of Jones, but I am going to open a can of whoop-ass on all murderes who may or may not be in this residence at this time. And by 'I', I mean GEORGE WASHINGTON JONES!"

In the time it took George Washington Jones to say all this,
Lee McGillis Lincoln buried his pumpkin carving implement
in his wife's heart
And George Washington Jones (the bride) looked up in shock and horror at her husband (Lee McGillis Lincoln)

"Your brother (George Washington Jones) is too late!" Lee cried.
"Oh yeah?" cried Geroge Washington Jones, kicking down the door, and taking aim with his musket at Lee McGillis Lincoln, and pulling the trigger, but missing entirely, and, actually, if truth be told, emptying an entire round of buckshot into the chest of his sister, George Washington Jones.

"Evil is triumphant once again!" Lee cried, cackling with the cackle that I already attempted to describe with a beautiful metaphor involving a dog or something.

And Lee leapt out the window
Thinking to grab hold of a wedding balloon
Filled with helium
A wedding balloon he had placed there
For just such a contigency
A wedding balloon to float away with
And thus make his escape from justice.

But Lee McGillis Lincoln had jumped out his last window
For his pockets were so weighed down with ill-gotten gold
His shoes and pockets were so stuffed with evil-induced wedding cake
That the single helium balloon would not hold him
Also his plan had been somewhat badly concieved
In that the helium balloon wouldn't have held him anyway

Anyway,
Lee fell forty feet
Since the bridal chamber was forty feet up
Into a pit of alligators
Which he had unwisely installed the day before
And there met his - untimely from his point of view but timely from most everynone else's point of view - end

Anyway, George Washington Jones lay dying
"Oh my brother," she then said.
"I should not have been so quick to wed."

He grasped her hand
And watched her die.
A melancholy kind of guy.

(The author apologize for the last two stanzas, or whatever you call them, and the attempts at rhyming, which should probably only be attempted by professional poets)

Anyway,
abandoning the corpse of his sister to the birds and insects
(He donated it to a Bird and Insect Zoo)
George Washington Jones set out on a journey across America
Warning children not to make the same mistake he did and eat uncoooked pork in Mexico City.

He always wore his white-powder wig
And gradually began to think of himself as George Washington.

And one day a man named Mr. Worm came to see him
And Mr. Worm, smiling through sharp teeth, said
"You were named by Myrtle and Ontario with the name of George Washington, and thus you should be president, just like the real George Washington."

And with Mr. Worm as his campaign advisor,
George Washington Jones became first a mayor, then a representative, then a senator, then for some reason a janitor, and then THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
With Mr. Worm as his vice-president

Then Mr. Worm said "Now, I want you to use all your power to raise taxes and bomb the southern states, and also the northern ones."

And George Washington Jones said "Does that mean Northern Virigina too?"
And Mr. Worm laughed and said "Yes, my dear, darling boy!"
And George Washington Jones said, "Never!"
"I made you!" cried Mr. Worm! "And I can destroy you!"
And Mr. Worm showed George Washington Jones photos that made it look like he was the one who had killed George Washington Jones in the bridal chamber in Northern Virginia all those years ago."

"I know everything about you!" Mr. Worm said. "I've been watching you for quite some time now. Since before you born. We have plans for you, buddy boy!"
"NOoooooooooooOO!" cried George Washington Jones, and fled from the White House
Fled deep ingo the heart of America
Lived in fact, in the very same house in North Virginia
Where George Washington Jones had died so long ago
And though there was much discussion of the sudden dissapperance of the President
And many searches and stuff like that
Nobody found him.

And Mr. Worm became President, and began his worldwide reign of terror.

Anyway,
George Washington Jones grew old in the house, and the house grew old with him.
And everyday, as he went to feed the alligators,
He would see the likeness of his sister George Washington Jones everywhere
Beckoning him to join her on the other side
Or some silly ghost crap like
He never paid her any attention

George Washington Jones lived for fifty years in that house
Still wearing his wig
In deference to the great man he should have been
And never answered the phone
Because he knew who it would be
(Mr. Worm)
Except one day when he was ninety-two
He called his mother (Myrtle) 's number

And his mother answered the phone
Much to his surprise
Since he thought she'd be dead
And he said "This is your boy George Washington Jones."
And she said "Oh George" and began to cry, and said "Oh George. I thought you was dead," she said.
"Not dead," George Washington Jones said. "But my life has pretty much been worthless.
I am a failure.
I failed to save my sister from Lee McGillis Lincoln.
I failed to stand up to Mr. Worm.
I ran out on my job as President of the United States
Leaving Mr. Worm as President who fifty years later is still President.
I am just a miserable failure.
I am so lonely and alone."
"Now now," Myrtle said. "I love you."
And he began to cry for the first time in his life and it felt so good to cry.
"Do you want to talk to your father?" Myrtle said.
"Yes," said George Washington Jones, and he wanted in that moment, more than anything to talk to his father, and see what kind of a man his father had been, and how he could measure his life against his father's life, now that it was almost over.

But then he realized his mother and father were both dead
And he was holding a pinecone and not a phone
And collapsing on the ground he tried to pulled off his wig
In deference to the fact that he sucked and was totally unlike George Washington
And unworthy to wear the wig.

But the wig was uncomeoffable
In all the years he had worn it, it had become a part of his skull.
And George Washington Jones sat in the darkness, tugging at his wig
With his frail old hands
"I am not George Washington! I am not George Washington!" he cried. "I should have been called Billy or Leo or Jordan or something."

Then Mr. Worm came
Smiling, out of the darknesss
With a candle in his hand
"Poor boy," Mr. Worm said. "To try so hard to do good, and be trumped at every turn by your own inevitable mediocrity and fear. You are like a butterfly that has transformed itself into a worm. You are my child, and I have come for you at the hour of your death. Take my hand."

And George Washington Jones reached and took Mr. Worm's hand.
But then the ghost of his sister George Washington Jones appeared again
And looking into her beautiful face, he remembered all the good times they had together
And how sweet and nice she was,
And he remembered whe he wanted to protect her from Lee McGillis Lincoln in the first place
(Or was Lee McGillis Lincoln just a mask for Mr. Worm?)

And he knew he would never break his hand from Mr. Worm's grip
So he took the pumkin carving thing (which was lying on the floor in the room he was in)
And smote off his own hand.
And Mr. Worm let out a great shriek and disappeared in a cloud of locusts.

"He was right about one thing," George Washihngton Jones said. "I am a mediocrity."
"Meh," said his sister, George Washington Jones. "You smote off your own hand to defy Mr. Worm. That was pretty non-mediocre. If you ask me."

Anyway,
George Washington Jones took George Washington Jones hand
And they soared up into realms where even such amazingly great poetry as this cannot follow.