Signora Fortuna,
my lush lady luck;
from this thicket a rose
for your manicured pluck.
Signora Fortuna,
my sweet muse of chance;
must you stand on my toes
when the dice come to dance?
Signora Fortuna,
my fine bitch on heat;
my readies are willing
to fall at your feet.
Signora Fortuna,
my wanton Gestalt;
will you beef up my shilling
or slug me with salt?
By David Houston
Lady Luck
By DS Davidson
Sweet smile, evil eye
Romance always ends badly
Life falling apart
Lady Luck abandons you
Leaving disaster behind
The Desire And Wanting Of Favours
By Clive Donovan
We used to play at stroking Buddha’s belly,
Rubbing to encourage luck.
We sent aloft our supplications,
Puffs of prayers in fragrant smoke,
In ceremonies we indulged,
Befriending useful acolytes.
We offered up and often ate
The bribes of our own sacrifices.
We invented the glory of deities
And, too, their fickle wives.
We shamelessly panhandled them,
Adoring to improve our lives.
But now we are sophisticates, so smooth,
We merely have to visualize;
We summon up deft images
With potent positive focused thought
Creating manifold abundances of wealth
From which to choose
All aught whilom we did desire.
These dreamed-up rites of modern witchery
I eschew,
Neutralized
And nobbled
By the scheming writ of robber gods
who rushed
To rub and bribe me, fed and scried
And then decreed I could receive
Most anything asked for, rich and goodly
Except the best, the gift-boxed best,
Bare-grasped…deprived…of precious you.
The Astrological Sign and The Dollar Sign
By Mark Hudson
One day in my printmaking art class a man did
an amazing print of a mountain ram, and two women
were so impressed, that they both offered to buy the
proof that was done on newsprint.
They were both interested, so one of the women,
a Northwestern professor, suggested, “Let’s flip a coin.”
They flipped a coin, and the Northwestern
professor won the print.
“I knew my astrological sign was at its heightened
power today,” said the Northwestern professor. She then
paid for the print, and took it and went home.
As soon as she left, the man pulled out another
version of the exact same print on really good paper
and sold it for a higher price to the other woman, but
it was on a better paper that would be more archival.
Perhaps the lesson to learn is haste makes waste.
Or perhaps it means that you cannot always trust astrology. Is
that why on dollar bills it says, “In God we trust?”
Cursed
By Aeronwy Dafies
The Evil Eye
Directed at you
A curse projected
Upon your soul
Every little mishap
Possible shall come your way
A missed bus
A missed appointment
Any form of bad luck
Growing worse and worse
Until…
Luck Faking
By Clive Donovan
You tread on cracks crazing the pavement
And pretend you didn’t.
You hide an ace up your sleeve when you know
There’s one already on the baize
And even cheat with clover leaves
Adding one with three to make four.
Stealing luck. Amazing! Fake!
Tricks like this don’t work no more,
So: walk beneath that leaning ladder
Outside number thirteen’s door,
And chuck away those horse-shoes. Invite
A short blond friend to start the year with.
I’ll be the cat that’s black that
One might see or maybe not at night
And no-one can agree on whether
It’s me, or if I’m lucky or not.
View From Atlantis 