Nobody Likes You
[Poetry]
By Richard E. Noble

I am going to take this onto myself,
simply because no one else seems to be willing to do it.

I feel that you should know and be made to understand.
No one should be allowed to live in a complete delusion.

Now you listen to me.
PUT DOWN THAT NEWSPAPER!

Are you listening?
“Yes, I am.”

Okay -
No ... one ... likes ... you -
Let me repeat that, just in case you weren’t paying attention.

Look at me now! Okay, let me repeat
NO ... ONE ... LIKES ... YOU!

Did you get that?
Now I’m telling it to you like it is.

Absolutely no one who knows you, intimately or otherwise,
cares for you one iota.

Your Mother ... that’s right, your Mother
told me before she died,
that you were nothing but a pompous ass.

You are not constantly being disconnected by a faulty line
at the phone company.

Those people are hanging up on you.
You are abusive.

You are old and you are abusive.

Your employees all think that you are a skinflint.
You are so cheep you make Jack Benny look like a big spender.

You pay out wages to people as if
they are being donated to a charitable organization.

Let me clue you in,
your employees think that they more than earn
the pittance that they are begrudgingly granted
by Your Highness.

You live like a Coolie;
and you are loaded.
What in God’s name is wrong with you?

Don’t tell me about the damn Depression.
I’m as old as you are and I know darn well
you weren’t even alive during the Depression.

You were born in an age of prosperity.
Your parents were professionals.
You are simply ... cheap.

You are so cheap you reek.

You are small minded.
You are jealous of everybody.
You think you know everything.
You are an elitist, obnoxious, pompous ass.

If you didn’t have the money to pay for other people’s attention,
there is nobody in this world who would even talk to you.

“I feel that you are exaggerating.”

I could have guessed.