The Maltese Falcon At Mar-A-Lago: A Poem
Narrator of poem:
“How are ya, sweetheart?
I’m the ghost of Humphrey Bogart
I was recently challenged by my friend the ghost of Orson Welles
to see if I still got tough guy and private eye skills
that I used to have in my movies.
So I took him up on his challenge and headed down to Florida
The site of one of my popular films Key Largo
I heard about this swanky place down there called Mar-a-Lago
A private Palm Beach, Florida club owned by a temper tantrum throwing
spoiled brat billionaire named Donald Trump
Imagine my surprise when I heard this bozo
was also the President of the United States
The country has certainly gone down hill
since the days of Harry Truman
I figure.
Anyways a Chinese lady spy named Yujing Zhang
was arrested at the club trying to enter it with a
thumb drive containing malware
I had no idea what a thumb drive is
Thought it might be that a car was driven by your thumb
instead of both hands in this day and age
or maybe some newly designed form of golf club
they came up with that quite literally relies on the rule of thumb
And as for malware, I thought it was some guy named Mel Ware
who just might be the uncle of Token Ware
a female character in a Raymond Chandler Philip Marlowe story
I was set straight on the new developments in technology
by the ghosts of eccentric Serb-American inventor Nikola Tesla
and some British guy named Alan Turing
who made a name for himself in mathematics
Anyways it turns out this Yujing Zhang wasn’t the only femme fatale
causing intrigue down at Club Mar-a-Lago
Some woman named Li Cindy Yang is also involved
It turns out she owns a massage parlour
where prostitution is said to be going on
on the premises
One of her arrested johns was a Mr. Robert Kraft
the owner of a football team called The New England Patriots
The case is made even more interesting by the fact
that the team’s quarterback Tom Brady
claims he’s able to win football games
through the help of his wife
Gisele Bundchen
who’s a witch.
The whole thing reminds me of a film my friend Veronica Lake
made back in 1942
called I Married A Witch
So you can imagine my surprise when I walked through the door
of Club Mar-a-Lago
and saw the Maltese Falcon on the table
That old bird that appeared in the film by that title
That I starred in back in 1941
Around the table lay the bodies of various secret service agents
who had been completely drained of blood
A beautiful Chinese woman wearing a white evening dress
stood outside the club dining room window
in the middle of the pouring rain
“That most enchanting and intriguing woman is the Chinese Communist vampiress Mei-ling Manchu,”
The ghost of Orson Welles arrived in the nick of time
sipping a glass of red wine,
“She’s the daughter of Dr. Fu Manchu the famous scientist
whose exploits were written about in the novels of Sax Rohmer”.
“What’s she doing here?” I asked Welles.
Welles smiled, “She’s hidden a bunch of condoms owned by the Knights of Malta
in that Maltese Falcon.
That way when they’re found by law enforcement authorities
who are already on their way over here
The find will prove to be problematic and embarrassing
for both Donald Trump and Pope Francis
And the Chinese government will have killed two birds with one stone.”
“Well, that explains the pair of sunglass wearing dead pink flamingos I passed by on the lawn on the way in then,” I remarked
“Those are actually lawn ornaments knocked over by drunken country club members,” Welles finished his wine.
I noticed Mei-ling Manchu approach a fire-breathing Black Dragon
and crawl on to its back
“Off to Venezuela,” she said, “There to watch the Donald play his final Trump card before we divide this land between ourselves and the Russians.”
She and the Dragon flew off into the night sky
I walked outside to watch the Dragon and the vampiress depart
I looked down at the two pink flamingos and remarked to Welles,
“Well, I suppose the problems of two flamingos don’t amount to a hill of beans in this world.”
Welles lit himself a cigar and remarked, “Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But someday and soon.”
Some young woman named Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stood outside the club and waved a document called the Green New Deal.
“Bogey on the 18th hole,” the ghost of Arnold Palmer remarked as he walked by with his golf clubs.
I laughed, patted Welles on the shoulder and said,
“You know, Orson, this could be the start of a beautiful friendship”
As we walked off into the misty greens.
-A poem and vampire novel chapter
written by Christopher
Wednesday April 3rd
2019.
Isabel Esmeronde: Cuban Singer Extraordinaire
Isabel Esmeronde: Cuban singer extraordinaire
The year was 1956.
And U.S. Vice-President Richard M. Nixon sat in the LA private eye office of Carson Cody Albion.
Carson Cody Albion was an immortal Private Eye.
Quite literally immortal.
He had been turned immortal by the Syro-Phoenician goddess Atargatis back on May 8th 1945 when her breasts started lactating over the news that Nazi Germany had unconditionally surrendered over in Europe.
Albion, who was going through severe bourbon withdrawal at the time, immediately started drinking the milk and became immortal.
Atargatis: Prior to hearing the news of Germany’s surrender on May 8th 1945.
“I’ve been told you’re the height of discretion, Mr. Albion,” Nixon said.
“That I am,” Albion turned off his tape recorder, “Normally I like to record my clients’ conversations but in your case, I’ll make an exception.”
“Those tape recorders are kind of handy things, aren’t they?” Nixon looked at the machine, “I might have to start using them someday.”
“What can I do for you, Mr. Vice-President?” Albion asked.
“Well, as you know I saved my political ass four years ago by the fact I owned a dog named Checkers and my wife Pat owned a good Republican cloth coat and not a mink coat,” Nixon said.
“I recall that,” Albion nodded.
“Anyways that damned fool Nelson Rockefeller went and bought my wife Pat a mink coat last Christmas,” Nixon frowned.
“Why did he do that?” Albion looked perplexed.
“I’ve been told that it was vengeance for my leaving his hotel room door open for his wife Mary at the 1952 Republican convention,” Nixon now looked perplexed, “She apparently walked into the bedroom while some British woman named Sherrielock Holmes was showing Nelson how to make tomatoed buns. I thought Mary would be happy about someone showing her husband how to cook but apparently she wasn’t.”
“So Rocky bought Pat a mink coat as vengeance?” Albion ate some jelly beans.
“That’s right,” Nixon said, “And now it’s been stolen. By the Mafia. And they’re offering it for sale to the highest bidder down at a casino in Havana. That bastard Joe Kennedy Sr., the father of Sen. Jack Kennedy, is going to try to buy it in a move designed to embarrass me. He’ll present it to the press as evidence that “Pat doesn’t have cloth to mink around anymore.” The swine.”
“So what would you like me to do?” Albion asked.
“It will be offered both at the cards table and then the roulette table prior to auction,” Nixon scratched his nose, “I want you to try to win it for me ahead of time.”
. . .
Fidel Castro sat in the lobby of the Spanish Crown casino.
He pointed out the decor and the clientele to his friend Ernesto Che Guevara.
Said Castro bitterly, “This is what Batista wants to turn all of Cuba into. A playground for America’s wealthy.”
. . .
“Who is the best poker player in all of Cuba?” Albion asked the British Ambassador to Havana.
“And what do you want with the best poker player in all of Cuba?” Sir Justin Burstpipes asked.
“I need him to win a mink coat for me,” Albion replied.
“You always come up with the most interesting answers to my questions, Albion,” Sir Justin sipped his gin, “We could use you at the Foreign Office in London. Your answers could shake the dust off the cobwebs there. But in answer to your question, the best poker player in Cuba is a her not a him.”
“And who is she?” Albion asked.
“Right over there,” Sir Justin Burstpipes pointed in her direction, “Isabel Esmeronde, Cuban singer extraordinaire.”
. . .
Isabel Esmeronde won Pat Nixon’s mink coat at the poker table.
Carson Cody Albion lived up to the British Ambassador’s last name as soon as he saw her as did the British Ambassador himself.
After Isabel left the cards table, Albion said to her, “Can I buy you a drink?”.
Isabel smiled and shook her head no, “I have an appointment with a time traveling Canadian vampire hunter later tonight.”
And with that statement, she bowed and left.
“Well with her answers and her assets, she’d definitely shake up the Foreign Office in London for the better,” Sir Justin Burstpipes remarked as he gazed at her entrance into the casino lounge.
Later in the lounge that night, Isabel Esmeronde sang, “Some enchanted evening, you may see a stranger…”
Dracul Van Helsing time traveler from the future watched her sing.
He loved enchanted evenings.
Isabel Esmeronde: Some enchanted evening
-A vampire novel chapter
written by Christopher
Wednesday March 27th
2019.
The Debutante’s Ball 1941: A Poem
Marissa Van Horne, Debutante
“You’re here to escort me to the ball, Mr. Albion?”
The laughing smiling face of the beautiful young woman
looked at me with merriment and amusement in her sparkling eyes
which glimmered like stars above her sunshine golden gown,
“A famed Los Angeles private eye reduced to a chaperone?”
I, Carson Cody Albion, stopped in my tracks
when I heard this statement
I was a private eye
But I had never thought of myself as famed.
“Don’t be so modest,” Marissa remarked with a wry smile as if she could read my mind, “of course you are!”
“The ball starts at 8 PM?” I queried looking at my watch.
“Yes, but drinks are served starting at 7,” she laughed.
“I don’t think your parents hired me to watch you get inebriated before the ball,” I said as I held open the arms of her fur coat
so she could finish her fashion ensemble for the evening.
Only the LA glitterati rich would wear fur coats
on a hot Los Angeles evening
But as the hired help, what did I know?
“No,” she slid her arms through the coat, “my parents hired you to keep me away from Lev Tomi.”
That was true.
They had.
Titus Van Horne was an influential newspaper editor in the city.
He seemed to know everything about everyone in the state of California
A West Coast J. Edgar Hoover as it were
Minus that DC bureaucrat’s penchant for wearing women’s clothing in private
Which was a good thing for the Van Horne family fortune
For the Paris dresses and gowns that Mrs. Van Horne and daughter Marissa wore
were already keeping the Bank of Monte Carlo afloat
to say nothing of Hitler’s Reich
while the Vichy government were reduced to making money off mineral water
A third Van Horne (and a male one at that) adorning the best of Parisienne feminine apparel
would definitely have put the Van Horne family fortune in the red
like Alger Hiss in the U.S. State Department
Van Horne knew all about Orson Welles’ private life
He had to
For the Boy Wonder of New York radio and theatre
was making a movie based on the life of Van Horne’s boss
But Van Horne knew nothing whatsoever about Lev Tomi
This older man that young Marissa had started seeing at the start of this year
Marissa just claimed that she was taking Russian language lessons from him
Nothing like a LA society girl with a hankering to visit the Soviet Union and see Josef Stalin’s paradise for herself
The movie The Grapes of Wrath had recently been shown in Moscow
Uncle Joe had hoped that this would cause outrage among Moscow’s workers
when they saw how the poor in America were treated
It caused outrage all right
but not in the way that Uncle Joe had hoped
Moscow workers had become outraged that the poor in America actually owned their own trucks
Viewings of the movie soon became obsolete in the USSR
Joining the obsolescence of most personally owned motor vehicles among the common people there
When Marissa came home and told her parents
that she had asked Lev Tomi to be her date
to the LA society’s debutante ball
Titus Van Horne finally put his foot down
causing him to be rushed to LA General Hospital
to get his now even deeper ingrown toe nail surgically removed
After a week of recuperation, Titus Van Horne and his wife Olivia came to see me
And asked me to be Marissa’s escort to the debutante’s ball
Since I had nothing pressing on me at the moment
Save some old white shirts that needed to be steampressed at the neighbourhood’s Chinese laundry
I took the case.
Olivia and Titus Van Horne asked Carson Cody Albion Private Eye to be their daughter Marissa’s escort to the LA society elite debutante’s ball
As I got into the back of the limousine with Marissa
I instructed the chauffeur to drive us to Ming Lo’s Blue Lantern Restaurant
I figured imbibing Marissa with a light Chinese dinner at 7
would far be safer than imbibing her with drinks prior to the ball
I turned out to be wrong on that
It must have been the spicy chop suey
that was the Blue Lantern special
It turned Marissa into a tigress in heat
And I was explorer Frank Buck
Bringing her back alive
It was now 11 PM
I had failed to present Miss Van Horne to the debutante’s ball by some 3 hours
Her beautiful gold dress lying on the seat of the booth along with her nylons and spiked stilettos
And all my clothes lying on the floor underneath the table
Implied a very unusual Russian language lesson was going on
when coincidentally Mr. and Mrs. Van Horne entered the restaurant right at 11 PM
I felt no inclination to open my fortune cookie which the waiter just brought
If it was accurate, I knew well what it would say
You can send me my cheque in the mail for my services
I hastily said to Mr. Van Horne before heading out into the night
like a stallion galloping out into the Santa Ana winds
I had no idea who this Lev Tomi fellow was
But I think I may have just saved his life
Too bad, I can’t say the same for my own.
-Carson Cody Albion Private Eye
-A Carson Cody Albion
Private Eye poem
and vampire novel chapter
written by Christopher
Monday March 18th
2018
Agathor Christie, Magog Rhys Petley and The Mysterious Death of Natacha Jaitt
London private eye Agathor Christie sat in his office along with his partner private eye Magog Rhys Petley.
Christie had been the British Conservative Member of Parliament for the constituency of Tewkesbury In The Cotswolds until his defeat by British Transhumanist candidate Renfield R. Renfield in the last UK general election.
Magog Rhys Petley on the other hand had been the British Labour Party Member of Parliament for the constituency of Newbridge In Wales until his defeat by British Transhumanist candidate the Welsh vampiress Morgana Fay Lee in the last UK general election.
Since both men had lost their parliamentary seats to the same upstart political party, they decided to go into business together as private eyes.
A woman who looked like she was a young widow from the Victorian Age entered their office.
She wore a full length black dress, black veil and black hat.
Both men could tell by looking through the veil that the woman was young and exceedingly beautiful.
“Hello, senor,” the woman spoke in an Argentinian accent which Christie recognized as Argentinian since he had once vacationed in Buenos Aires.
“How can I help you?” Christie asked.
“I want you to investigate the death of a friend of mine Natacha Jaitt,” the woman said.
Natacha Jaitt was a former Playboy model and adult film star in Argentina who had spent much of her life fighting against the sex trafficking of children.
She had been due to testify against Gustavo Vera in two weeks time on the issue of trafficking of children.
But she was found dead of respiratory and multiple organ failure this past February 23rd.
Cocaine was found in the room but both her brother and her lawyer claimed she no longer used cocaine.
Last year on April 5th 2018, she had written a tweet that if she was ever found dead under mysterious circumstances, she did not commit suicide nor would she use drugs.
She would most likely have been murdered for opposing a pedophile sex ring in Argentina she said.
Gustavo Vera the man she was supposed to testify against headed an ostensibly anti-trafficking organization called the Alameda Foundation,
However in her research, Natacha Jaitt had made the claim that Vera just used the Alameda Foundation as a means to eliminate his competition in the sex trafficking industry.
Gustavo Vera was also a good friend of Pope Francis that the pontiff spoke to on a weekly basis.
In the video footage of investigating that Jaitt was doing on child sex trafficking, she ran into an Eastern European man who made the claim that Vera also trafficked children to influential figures in the Vatican including Pope Francis.
“What? Pope Francis himself?” Christie stopped the woman in the black veil.
“So the man said that Natacha interviewed,” the woman said, “I think any further evidence she had would have been part of her testimony. Along with her assertion that various youth soccer clubs and teams in Argentina trafficked in children for sexploitation purposes.”
“Well, if her allegations were true, I can see why she’s dead,” Magog Rhys Petley remarked.
“Will you take the case, senors?” The woman in the veil asked.
“Well, if her allegations involving Francis and the Vatican are true,” Magog gulped, “we’re dealing with one of the most powerful and ruthless network of criminals since the Borgia family ran the Papacy in the Renaissance. We might wind up dead as well.”
“I’m in,” Agathor Christie remarked calmly as he drank a cup of tea.
“Oh, what the heck,” Magog downed an entire bottle of vodka, “I’m in as well.
-A vampire novel chapter
written by Christopher
Tuesday March 5th
2018.
Nice Work On The Trinity Case, Mr. Albion: A Poem
“Nice work on the Trinity case, Mr. Albion.”
They came to Hollywood by the dozens
In search of fame and fortune
Positive they’d be the next goddess of the silver screen
Girls from the mid-west, girls from the northeast, girls from the south,
Girls from Canada
and girls from Mexico.
Such a girl was Trinity Esperanza
From Mexico City
19, she’d come to Hollywood with stars in her eyes
A week later
She had disappeared
A woman from another country
disappeared?
Who cares was the attitude here
Her disappearance wasn’t even reported in the press here
Just another foreigner who disappeared
Carson Cody Albion Private Eye would not have known about it
Unless the girl’s grandmother hadn’t shown up in his office
“Please find Trinity,” She begged
As she emptied her purse on the table
And with all the money sitting there
Albion looked down at the table
And counted the money in his head
$37.42
“Mrs. Esperanza,” he poured himself another glass of bourbon,
“How much money do you have in your bank account?”
” $37.42″, she answered.
Albion looked at her,
Drank the glass of bourbon
Lit himself a cigarette
And blew smoke at the ceiling
Where the fan quickly dispersed it to the 4 corners of his world-
his office.
“Put your money away,” he told Mrs. Esperanza, “this one’s on the house.”
Like all cases involving disappeared girls and Hollywood
The answer involved sex slaves and lecherous Hollywood producers
For what lay behind the red moviehouse theatre curtains
and the silver screen
was not silver
And definitely not gold
Images of dead Presidents on paper was the currency
And a lot of it
That was the language of Hollywood
Behind the scenes
Carson Cody Albion found Trinity
A prostitution ring that catered to those who lived behind the pearly gates of Beverly Hills
Paradise to those who owned the place
But Hell for some of those who worked there
Albion found Trinity
And after negotiating with the producer
Trinity was freed.
The price?
The real Maltese Falcon from that film a few years back.
Turned out the producer was a big fan of movies made by rival studios.
Albion’s burglary skills came in handy
and not even Sherlock Holmes could have solved the case
Basil Rathbone had other roles to play
Of course no one in LA seemed to care that a young Mexican girl was found
Save when Albion delivered Trinity to Mrs. Esperanza
One customer in a barber shop reflected the thinking
in general
They ought to build a wall to keep those people out
Albion looked at the man from the barber chair where he sat
“Thank God,” Albion thought, “FDR sits in the Oval Office and not this man”.
One day Albion was wandering on the set of the movie Cover Girl
When Rita Hayworth of all people addressed him,
“Nice work on the Trinity case, Mr. Albion.”
So spoke the woman whose real name was Margarita Carmen Cansino.
And on this night
Carson Cody Albion sat in a bar
He decided to order a glass of wine for a change
Maybe it was time he showed a little class as an ex-girlfriend once said to him
“Class? What is it?” Albion asked himself as he lit a cigarette
He reached into his coat pocket to pay the bill
“Put your money away,” Julio the bartender said, “this one’s on the house.”
-A Private Eye Poem
written by Christopher
Friday February 22nd
2019.
Cardi B. and The Time Traveller: A Poem
Singer Cardi B. flees Lancaster Hall in England in 1888 leaving behind a giant sized shoe.
“So you really expect me to believe you’re a time traveller from the year 2019?” Consulting detective Sherlock Holmes asked somewhat skeptically.
“Whether you believe it or not, it is true,” replied Dracul Van Helsing who had recently seen Achilles slay his enemy in a manner most Hectorly.
“I have worked on stranger cases,” Holmes admitted.
He looked at Dracul wondering if he should have him committed.
“And what do you mean by a hip hop singer?” Holmes looked as though he’d been through the ringer.
“Do not worry about musical terms from the future,” said Dracul, “rather worry about Cardi B. whom Vampiress Lilith wants to goose her.”
“May I ask why?” Holmes looked up at the dark sky.
“It has to do with Solomon and the Queen of Sheba,” Dracul stated in the midst of an atmospheric upheava.
Holmes looked confused, the coachman looked bemused and the estate cat looked amused.
“It has to do with Cardi B.’s real name,” Dracul played with an open window pane.
“Which is,” Van Helsing went on, “Belcalls Almanzar. Watch out for that falling star…
Holmes quickly jumped out of the way.
And the star landed in some hay.
Much to a hungry horse’s dismay.
His dinner went up in a blaze of smoke.
All that’s left- a solitary artichoke.
The horse ate the artichoke as Dracul continued his story,
“Lilith’s dealings with Solomon- somewhat gory…”
“But what does this have to do with Cardi B.?” Holmes lit his pipe under a tree.
“Her real name,” a soft breeze came, “Belcalls refers to the Queen of Sheba and Almanzar means watchtower. Watch that flower..”
Holmes avoided stepping on the Lancaster Hall estate’s red rose as the cat pranced about on tippy toes.
“So Lilith thinks Cardi B. is the watchtower of the Queen of Sheba,” Dracul went on, “so vampiress wreaks vengeance on Solomon by killing this singing diva.”
A scream went through the air as the terror that flies by night lost her shoes while Sherlock looked in the garden for more clues.
Cardi ran off after the terror by night while Lilith’s shoe glittered in the lamplight.
The next day, Cardi rode a white horse into the countryside
where horse and rider gave each other quite the ride.
-A poem and vampire novel chapter
written by Christopher
Thursday February 7th
2019.
The Duck Called Samuel Puddlington At Lake Louise: A Poem
He was the duck they called Samuel Puddlington
His girlfriend said he left things muddlington
since he often danced with other women
of the human variety at great estates while drinking gin gin
said she, “I find this neither fowl nor fair”
and left him for a strand of monkey hair
that had fallen from the American Trumpster’s toupee
that disgraced Scots German Donald who said there would be Hell to pay
unless Congress caved in and built him a wall
Sam took the news well and went to another grand ball
When he had finished dancing up a storm
like John Travolta with an itchy tape worm
his frog and rabbit friend suggested they go to Canada
and ski while wearing a bandana
So they headed way out west to beautiful Lake Louise
the gem of the Blue Canadian Rockies
They skiied here
They skiied there
and did so without underwear
but seeing as how they were animals no one minded
the same not the case for pot smoking Justin Trudeau who was fined-ed
for displaying nudity in public
while ho-hoing like Saint Nick
Later while having dinner at the Chateau Lake Louise
his rabbit and frog friend both started to sneeze
perhaps long underwear they should have worn
for they came down with colds and went to bed forlorn
Sam stayed in the dining room and finished his dinner
in dancing, skiing and eating he was always a winner
He noticed a gent had left his briefcase on a table
Being curious like oxen in a Nativity stable
He went over and took a peek
while finishing his soup cockaleek
They were the files of Carson Cody Albion Private Eye
a legendary immortal shamus detective guy
Sam helped himself to a gravy dipped French fry
Inside was an old black and white photo
black and white like Kansas for Toto
before reaching the colourful land of Oz
A land far away from reindeer and Santa Claus
The photo was of the legendary Jaguar Woman of New Orleans
a shapeshifting cat woman whose dress came apart at the seams
On a note next to the photo, Albion had carefully written
in writing so small, it could easily be flea bitten
if fleas would ever eat someone else’s words
but such thinking is for the birds
thought Sam like a duck out of water
as he watched bourbon getting the best of a drunken otter
Albion had written “The Jaguar Queen of New Orleans
whose dress in a 1930s jazz club came apart at the seams
is none other than Semiramis the legendary Queen of Babylon”
and Samuel Puddlington thought, What the Heck is going on
but that, dear reader, a tale to be told in a future New Year dawn
-A poem written by Christopher
Sunday December 30th
2018.
Haiku About Irene Adler
A great stage actress
stole Bohemian king’s heart
and then Sherlock Holmes’
Haiku About Sherlock Holmes of 221B Baker Street
Comfortable rooms
filled with smoke from a curved pipe
hides truly great mind
Sherlock Holmes and Jack The Ripper: A Haiku
Sherlock Holmes and Jack The Ripper: A Haiku
Holmes had Jack in lab
electrocuted him because
The courts would acquit
When you’re as important in society as Jack was, the Old Bailey would never convict.
So Sherlock Holmes took matters in his own hand.
Years later, Nikola Tesla would re-enact Holmes’ test for his friend Mark Twain.
But without using a living subject like the great British detective did.
