Poetic License: ‘Chanson Chartreuse (A La Doctor Seuss)’

Joe Pacheco
I cannot wear or drink chartreuse
Because I’m gander and not goose,
As color it is too abstruse
Not green nor yellow is chartreuse.
Now just imagine a burnoose
And caftan dyed in bright chartreuse,
What Valentino could seduce
A maid while wearing all chartreuse;
Or cowboy make Injun vamoose
With boots and saddle in chartreuse,
Then lock crooks up in calaboose
With gun pearl- handled in chartreuse
And ride away on his Cayuse
Into a sunset of chartreuse?
On Mount Olympus, the Gods and Zeus
Drank pink ambrosia, not Chartreuse.
When dumb Pandora set evils loose
The worse of them was green Chartreuse:
A drink that looks like lizard juice
Squeezed by monks from old Chartreuse
And mixed with vomit of mongoose –
The secret formula of Chartreuse:
It saved the monasteries from abuse,
Did world- wide proceeds from Chartreuse.
Distinguished writer Marcel Proust
Would dip his cookies in Chartreuse,
And Charles de Gaulle without excuse
Filled his chocolates with Chartreuse,
While flatulent cattle near Toulouse
Were given water and Chartreuse.
Now recipes for chocolate mousse
Boast key ingredients like Chartreuse,
In gay Paris a Charlotte Russe
Is topped with crme a la Chartreuse.
Apologies to Dr. Seuss,
I don’t like ham and eggs Chartreuse,
I will not eat them in a caboose
With Sam-I-Am and green Chartreuse.
Stop! Now I find in my La Rousse
Another way to say chartreuse:
An elegant way to ask for booze
Is “s’il vous plait, garon, Chartreuse?”
And when I listen to the news
There are still some who say chartreuse.
A whole new set of rhymes to use
If I pronounce it as chartreuse!
But I’ll leave it to another muse
To make the most of French chartreuse
And turn to why I did produce
A poem written on chartreuse:
A class assignment to unloose
The poet within upon chartreuse;
Expand it boldly to traduce
A color other than chartreuse.
On my hate list, the color puce
Is second only to chartreuse,
Papoose and spruce and monk recluse
Are rhymes left over from “Chartreuse”
Its time for me to shake them loose –
Poetic justice for color puce!