Celebrity Death Haiku

J.D. Salinger

1919 – 2010

Obituaries

Intrude on my privacy

Make them go away

— Meanie the Blue

* * * 

Will we see more

Glass now or did he decide

To take them with him

— Lairbo

* * * 

Didn't realize the 

Surest way to solitude

Is ubiquity

— Phil Valens

* * *

Only question now

Is which relative will tell

All first and for most

— Russell 1000

Howard Zinn

1922 – 2010

Debunked the Pilgrims

Made us ask whose history

Is it, anyway?

— babatjie

Pernell Roberts

1928 – 2010

Trapper John was bald

Adam's hair was thick; was it

A rug or acting?

— Lairbo

* * *

Left Ponderosa

In a huff, wound up in San

Fran as grouchy doc

— Russell 1000

Kate McGarrigle

1946 – 2010

My wheel-like heart, bent

Without Kate McGarrigle

No more sister act

— babatjie

* * *

Leaves us with a couple 

More Wainwrights and a wealth of

Memorable music

— Lairbo

Erich Segal

1937 – 2010

Singlehandedly

Revived four-hankie weepers

As movie genre

— Lairbo

 

* * *

Love means saying you're 

Sorry a lot, even if 

You're not sure what for

— Phil Valens

* * *

Yellow Submarine

Doesn't begin to balance

Love Story's hokum

— Lairbo

Robert B. Parker

1932 – 2010

Hired away from Spenser

Long enough to finish off

Philip Marlowe twice

— Lairbo

Glenn Bell Jr.

1923 – 2010

Did to tacos what

McD's — for better and worse —

Did to hamburgers

— Lairbo

* * *

Taco Bell founder

Gets his last order to go

First the dog, now this!

— Russell 1000

Donald Goerke

1926 – 2010

Uh-oh. The guy who

Created SpaghettiOs

Passed his sell-by date

— Lairbo

Teddy Pendergrass

1950 – 2010

Virile vocals and

Sensual lyrics crackled with

An erotic charge

— Lairbo

Miep Geis

1909 – 2010

Hid not just Anne, but 

Her cows, too. What? Diary?

Ohhhhh, that makes more sense

— Jeff Tiedrich

Art Clokey

1921 – 2009

Trippiest TV 

Around until the Kroffts went

All psychedelic

— Russell 1000

* * *

Gumby, Pokey and

Davey & Goliath? Who

The hell was this guy?

— Phil Valens

* * *

Green guy with slanted 

Head, bell-bottom legs and 

A talking horse friend?

— Lairbo

David Levine

1926 – 2009

Drew the famous and

Powerful (and sometimes blood)

With sharp lines and wit

— Lairbo

* * *

Once in the crosshairs

Of his crosshatching there was

Simply no escape

— Russell 1000

Brittany Murphy

1977 – 2009

Shooting starlet leaves

Only thin traces of a

Career that won't be

— Russell 1000

* * *

Brittany's best role

Ironically, The Dead Girl

Soon a cult classic?

— babatjie

Roy E. Disney

1930 – 2009

Huey or Louie

To Uncle Walt's Donald; a

Mini to his Mouse

— St. Blaise

Oral Roberts

1918 – 2009

Healed those stricken with

Full wallets and empty heads

God's extortionist

— Russell 1000

* * *

Fleeced flock for millions

Claiming God held him hostage

Ransom paid in full

— Phil Valens

Gene Barry

1919 – 2009

Fought TV bad guys

In suave, high style as both Burke

And Bat Masterson

— Lairbo

Thomas Hoving

1931 – 2009

Blockbuster showman

Hoving made those mummies dance

Tut, Tut Steve Martin

— Lairbo

Robert Degen

1905 – 2009

Shake it all about

Days are over now; he's poked

His final hokey

— Lairbo

* * *

Put his right hand in

With the rest of him; no more

Shaking all about

— Phil Valens

Jeanne-Claude

1935 – 2009

Jeanne-Claude wraps up her

Collaboration with Christo

Her next gates? Pearly

— Phil Valens

Sy Syms

1926 – 2009

The Grim Reaper, an

Educated consumer,

Gets Sy off-the-rack

— Lairbo

David Lloyd

1934 – 2009

David Lloyd's passing 

Was more somber, one hopes, than

When Chuckles bit it

— Jeff Tiedrich

Claude Lévi-Strauss

1908 – 2009

No matter where he

Looked, there was human nature

Up to its old tricks

— Lairbo

* * *

Making sense of life,

He found, was mythology's

Universal truth

— Phil Valens

Soupy Sales

1926 – 2009

Best kids' show ever

Pie fights, puppets and — surprise!

A knock at the door

— Lairbo

* * *

Young at Heart never

Never sounded better than 

When Pookie sang it

— Phil Valens

* * *

Like Pee Wee's Playhouse,

Minus the post-modern and

Way creepy subtexts

— Russell 1000

Vic Mizzy

1916 – 2009

TV theme tunesmith

Scores big using finger snaps

And a harpsichord

— Lairbo

Dickie Peterson

1948 – 2009

Ain't no cure for the

Summertime blues. Oh yeah, and

Liver cancer, too

— Jeff Tiedrich

Irving Penn

1917 – 2009

Subject matter did

Not matter so much to him

He was making art

— Lairbo

* * *

Fame, fashion, fortune

Art without artifice

Always clean and clear

— Russell 1000

Lucy (in the Sky with Diamonds) O'Donnell Vodden

1962 – 2009

"Julian drew it..."

I always thought that was John

Covering his ass

— Jeff Tiedrich

* * *

Picture yourself in

A boat on a river — it

Sure beats a coffin

— Jeff Tiedrich

William Safire

1929 – 2009

A man of the Times

Nixed negative nattering

Yet nabobs loved him

— Russell 1000

* * *

Lexicographic 

Irregulars bow their heads

The Squad Squad bows twice

— Meanie the Blue

* * *

William Safire

Now nattering nabob of

Decomposition

 — Jeff Tiedrich

Irving Kristol

1920 – 2009

Counterpunched youthful 

Trotskyist leanings with a 

Hard right to the left

— Lairbo

* * *

Neocons mourning 

Spiritual godfather

Of their bastard creed

— St. Blaise

Mary Travers

1936 – 2009

Left Peter and Paul

Puffing the Magic Dragon

No jet plane needed

— Meanie the Blue

* * *

Mary Travers left

In coffin not on jet plane

Friend, that answer blows!

— babatjie

Henry Gibson

1935 – 2009

Gone now, and that's 

Too bad; Forgotten sooner

And that's too badder

— Lairbo

Patrick Swayze

1952 – 2009

Terrific dancer,

Dirty and otherwise. Now  

(Again) dreamboat ghost

— Lairbo

* * *

Made Whoopie Goldberg

Plausible as object of 

Demi Moore's longing

— Phil Valens

Jim Carroll

1949 – 2009

A Catholic Boy

Joins his friends who have died, died

It still beats Riker's

— Meanie the Blue

Larry Gelbart

1928 — 2009

M*A*S*H, Tootsie... Oh God!

Funny things happened on the way

From his typewriter 

— St. Blaise

Army Archerd

1922 – 2009

Bev Hills, Nate 'n' Al's:

Army dug pastrami, dished

Lots of baloney

 — St. Blaise

* * *

For better and worse

He squinted past glamour and

Told us what was there

— Russell 1000

Dominick Dunne

1925 – 2009

Lived in the shadow

Of John Gregory, then died

In Ted Kennedy's

— Lairbo

* * * 

As Farrah's death was 

To Jacko's, Dominick Dunne's

Was to Kennedy's

— Phil Valens