Lydia, De-Tattooed Lady
—with apologies to Groucho Marx
The years she spent performing in the sun
Have made her epidermis overdone.
To make things worse, in each one of her shows
She posed onstage in scarcely any clothes.
If Lydia had sheltered from the weather
Perhaps her skin would not be tough as leather;
But now those bold tattoos that she acquired
Have grown too worn and warped to be admired.
That’s why the Circus cosmetologist
Has sent her to a dermatologist:
To crown her fifty years of sideshow life
This aging star will brave a laser knife.
And even though she seems a youthful 80,
Miss Lydia, the famous tattooed lady,
(That splendid beacon of artistic taste)
Will have each masterpiece-on-skin erased.
Scratched off her back forever: Waterloo,
The seven dwarves and Cinderella’s shoe.
No Alcatraz, Big Ben nor the Bronx Zoo;
And furled forever—the Red White and Blue.
Forget the Alamo! Forget the Maine!
Say ciao to all her amber waves of grain!
No more shall muscles stretch to look like Spain
Nor flex to show a savory Quiche Lorraine.
No Godfather, no rival Mafiosi;
No fang-bites now to mark Bela Lugosi;
No glockenspiel; no trombone virtuosi;
And gone now from her tush: Nancy Pelosi.
Her thighs will never more depict Times Square,
Nor Washington upon the Delaware;
Her shin? Devoid of Soros in his lair.
Her elbows? No more Sonny, no more Cher.
Above her navel there’s no more RuPaul;
No Hillary compelling Bill to crawl;
No Greta Thunberg sunning on a trawl,
Nor Caesar as he enfilades through Gaul.
No Fosse on her calf displays jazz hands;
Erased—that admiral who came out as trans;
No Guildenstern, alas, no Rosencrantz;
Nor galleries of Van Goghs or Cezannes.
Above her buttocks there’s no more Greek satyr;
Upon her shoulder there’s no more Darth Vader.
Her scapula is free now of Ralph Nader;
And neither hip is crossed by the Equator.
Farewell, Camille—that sad romantic cougher!
Adieu “The View”—each shrew a scolding scoffer!
The FBI’s made Lydia an offer…
(You’ll never guess where they found Jimmy Hoffa!)
Oh, Lydia, you once unrivaled queen
Of tattoos both historic and obscene,
Of famous objects, places geographic
Who drove hot ticket sales and frequent traffic—
You now are comprehensively flesh-hued,
And freed from promenading in the nude.
Relax now. No one’s going to stop and stare.
Your work is done. All paid by Medicare.
An Outside Job
—a pantoum
Not true that you’re a slob
When you pierce tongue and brow!
It’s all an outside job
So focus on the now.
When you pierce tongue and brow,
There’s none to say you’re wrong.
So focus on the now—
Just bellow like King Kong.
There’s none to say you’re wrong—
The world is your IKEA!
Just bellow like King Kong
And don a fake keffiyeh.
The world is your IKEA.
Claim “victim” like a pro
And don a fake keffiyeh
With morals just for show.
Claim “victim” like a pro?
Not true, that. You’re a slob
With morals just for show.
It’s all an outside job.
Brian Yapko is a retired lawyer whose poetry has appeared in over fifty journals. He is the winner of the 2023 SCP International Poetry Competition. Brian is also the author of several short stories, the science fiction novel El Nuevo Mundo and the gothic archaeological novel Bleeding Stone. He lives in Wimauma, Florida.
‘Lydia’ is very imaginative, Brian….I enjoyed reading it!
Thank you so much, Paul!
I laughed out loud just reading the title! Very amusing stuff, Brian!
Thank you so much, Cynthia! Believe it or not, it was hard for me to find the title to this piece — until I realized it was staring me in the face. So I’m glad it made you laugh!
Brian, brilliant satires on two of the sickest practices of our time: tattooing and body piercing.
At least in the case of Lydia, her tattoos were for the purpose of earning an honest living in a sideshow. But today tattoos and body piercings are purely performative public statements, designed to show onlookers your views, commitments, beliefs, and attitudes. The display is meant to certify yourself as nonconformist and transgressive.
I have to congratulate you on four magnificent rhymes:
Lugosi / Pelosi, Rosencrantz / Cezannes, Nader / Equator, offer / Hoffa.
Thank you very much indeed, Joe. I hoped you would enjoy these pieces — especially Lydia. Thank you for noticing those rhymes. Necessity is truly the mother of invention sometimes — even in poetry. I was certain I wanted the equator rhyme and the Jimmy Hoffa reference, so those stanza lines worked backwards from there. As for Jimmy Hoffa, I lived in Detroit much of my youth and so Hoffa lore was considerable. I wasn’t sure if people would get the reference for a mob-related disappearance which occurred in the 1970s.
These are both hilariously brilliant. At the following I literally laughed out loud:
“The FBI’s made Lydia an offer…
(You’ll never guess where they found Jimmy Hoffa!)”
By the time I’d wiped the tears from laughing I chuckled all the way through ‘An Outside Job’, which was really very clever. Thank you.
Thank you so much, Rohini! I confess that the Jimmy Hoffa reference made me howl when I first wrote it.
Brian, I’m sometimes stunned by what some of us produce when our moods are – ‘just so’! Here’s a typical, top-quality ‘Yapko’ piece that appears to address a cultural practice in a manner that seems to denounce it to some extent?? 🙂 What a wonderfully barbaric satire. This smoker cracked me up, good friend, and, as you would expect, I’m with you all the way. Great work. 🙂
Thank you so much, Mark! You know, I’m not sure if I go so far as to denounce either tattooing or piercings, but the way some people collect them strikes me — generally — as preposterously pretentious and a physiological manifestation of virtue-signalling. Honestly, all you have to do is look at someone these days — the tattoos, the piercings, the blue hair — and you know exactly how they voted in 2023, and you know exactly what they think about transgender issues, DEI, abortion, CRI and Israel/Gaza. It’s like a uniform and that’s why I think it’s yet another contemptible aspect of life in the 21st Century. I myself have no tattoos or piercings nor has the idea of turning my skin into art ever really crossed my mind. I’m perfectly happy with what God gave me without the need to turn myself into a canvass for delusional narcissistic fantasies.
I exempt Lydia from my harsh views. She had a good professional reason to pile them on.
“The FBI’s made Lydia an offer…(You’ll never guess where they found Jimmy Hoffa!)” As a former Michigoose (male is Michigander), your provocative Hoffa line made me howl, as did the rest of this poem. As for “An Outside Job”, ” You’re a slob With morals just for show” cuts through all their ‘cr-p’ like the knife that is their tongue. Brilliant Brian!
Thank you so much for reading and commenting, Laura! As a fellow former Michigander, I thought this reference might tickle you. In the late 1960s and early 70s, my family used to go with some regularity to the restaurant (Machus Red Fox) where Jimmy Hoffa was last seen alive in 1975. Hence, I feel a bit of personal interest in his disappearance. Thought you might as well. I’m glad the poems made you laugh!
Your surname rhymes (e.g. Lugosi/Pelosi) are stellar, Brian. You must know that in the past some sharp wit referred to Madame Speaker as Nancy Lugosi. My own nickname for that harridan is Darth Pelosi. I’m sure that if there were any way you could have avoided that -tologist/-tologist rhyme, you would have. You have given the idea of “saving one’s skin” a number of brand-new twists, while at the same time directing red-hot barbs at deserving targets. Poems like these are what keep me up at night and prepare me for the bright light of morning. Sleep well, but come awake ever more deeply.
Thank you so much, Kip! I had a great time with some of those rhymes — where else but in a comedy poem can a poet really cut loose and have fun with unexpected sonic linkages? I have not heard of Nancy “Lugosi” but boy does it fit. I used to think she was one of the most despicable people on the left. Actually, I still do. But that pool of horrid people just keeps expanding.
Mea culpa for the cosmetologist and dermotologist rhyme. I never felt like it was stellar, but I also figured that since this was a comedy poem channeling the Marx Bros I might be able to get away with it. From your indulgent tone, I think you are letting me know you noticed but are giving me a pass. Five-syllable words are hard to rhyme! So are four-syllable words. Right now I’m trying in vain to come up with a rhyme for Antarctica.
Rhymes for Antarctica: a particle, a fart ago, Spartacus, smart enough, garlicky. None of these are very good, but they might serve in a pinch.
Extremely funny and since no-one else has, I have to comment on the outstanding ‘word’ – and connection you make of it: “No glockenspiel; no trombone virtuosi;
And gone now from her tush: Nancy Pelosi.” – the positioning of the word ‘tush’ is just brilliant, hidden there, just behind its target! Not all the rhyme words need take all the credit, you see!!!
Hahaha! James, I’m so glad you noticed Nancy Pelosi’s “tush” reference and the not-so-veiled insult intended by it! Not to get overly OCD about word-choice, there were a number of words I could have used as a synonym for one’s behind. Somehow they seemed either tawdry or too tame. “Tush” with its Yiddish etymology seemed appropriately good-natured and slightly comical. I’m confident it’s the word Mel Brooks would have used. Or Groucho himself. You’re so right about the idea that “not all the rhyme words need take all the credit.” Word-choice in poetry is so important — especially in English since the English language is generally considered to have the largest vocabulary. This allows for extraordinary attention to nuance.
Brian, what an excellent pairing of playful, powerful, and insightful poems. This is biting satire at its finest. Like others, I thoroughly admire your creative and highly entertaining end rhymes, but most of all, I love the way you turn the much-loved circus oddity of Groucho’s Lydia into a contemporary commentary – the once-proud “tattooed lady,” whose youthful body told a chaotic story of culture and history, erasing the individuality of her past, with “All paid by Medicare” being the perfect sting in the tail: a reminder that even rebellion succumbs to bureaucracy in the cleanup of our past, subsidized by the system in yet another bureaucratic transaction. I read this poem as a tragicomedy, with each erased image being a joke and a lament, representing a world where everything political, controversial, and colorful is scrubbed away. My favorite line is, “Relax now. No one’s going to stop and stare.” – for me, this turned a moment of calm into invisibility and conformity… and made me ache for the loss of Lydia’s inky defiance.
And then the treat of a pantoum with the repeated lines used to maximum effect to get across a telling message. “An Outside Job” is a perfect title to capture the modern-day surface-deep “rebellion”, with the most striking and hilarious line being “The world is your IKEA,” brilliantly mocking how identity itself has become a flat-packed product one assembles in keeping with the current trend – because being seen to support the current thing is all that matters. Isn’t it amazing that rebellion comes pre-packaged into conformity… and those buying the lie wear it as proudly as Lydia once strutted non-conformist stuff.
The poems pair beautifully and remind me that a person’s identity should never be skin-deep. Brian, thank you very much indeed!
Susan, your comments on Brian’s poem are packed with absolute gems of wisdom. When I read “rebellion comes pre-packaged into conformity,” and “identity itself has become a flat-packed product one assembles in keeping with the current trend,” I slammed my fist down onto my desk top and shouted “YEAH!” in fierce agreement and gratification.
Brian’s poem is not just a brilliant tour de force — it also has generated some piercing and relevant commentary. I don’t give a damn what our enemies say — the SCP has become the most exciting poetry website in the Anglophone world.
Joe, I thoroughly agree regarding Susan’s deeply meaningful comment. Her insights on identity and conformity are so spot-on they should be required reading for every incoming freshman as they face the inevitable woke indoctrination of their peers and — with you and a few rare others excepted — their professors.
Thank you again for the kind words. And I also agree fully that the SCP is the most exciting poetry website in the Anglophone world. Evan has created and amazing platform for the refinement and exchange of ideas and he is to be heartily commended.
Susan, I’m so pleased that you enjoyed these poems! I did indeed plan them as a set and am glad that they worked that way, with the homage to Groucho’s rather innocent character contrasted to the somewhat vile social justice warrior in the second poem (who is indeed a slob.)
You mined these poems for every nuance and you are right to perceive my sense of sympathy with Lydia — her whole life was wrapped up in those tattoos and now the Circus is taking that away from her because they are no longer profitable. There are a whole bunch of associated thoughts here which I think you’ve really analyzed perfectly. I might add in two additional thoughts — a) ageism (the idea that now that she’s past her prime she no longer has value to draw in customers); and b) the casual way that this generation is able to simply erase history. Lydia is a human metaphor for the documentation of history (all the way back from Caesar through Waterloo to Greta Thunberg) all of which gets erased — and only because we now have the technology which can make that possible. You’re right to lament the loss of Lydia’s “inky defiance” and along with it is the record of who and where she has been.
Strangely, I also felt a bit sad at the idea that “no one’s going to stop and stare.” This was, after all, her whole life. And now… poof. Gone.
I’m especially pleased on the second poem that you liked my IKEA reference. You nailed its significance here. Identity has indeed become a product once assembles to keep up with the current trend. Just so. IKEA, for me, is a form of consumer hell in which every party is fungible and quality is sacrificed for convenience. I’ve always wanted to use the reference in a poem! Along with King Kong. Neither is your typical poetical cultural reference and that made it more fun to write, even though I DETEST the subject of the poem.
I’m so glad you zeroed in on identity in both of these poems. In one, the tattoos at least document a life well-lived. In the second, our little Greta-like subject has no character whatsoever to speak of other than bellowing and pandering. Thank you, Susan. Your comment has really inspired me.
Readers, I have to share Groucho Marx (with Harpo and Chico) performing “Lydia, the Tattooed Lady” in At the Circus. Amiable (but brilliant) nonsense which got me thinking about satiric possibilities…
https://youtu.be/n4zRe_wvJw8?si=rkTHar1uLVEj6tTB
A bit of trivia. This song is by Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg — the same team that wrote all of the songs for The Wizard of Oz, which came out the same year.
I really love both poems… but Lydia… wow!
And your takedown of the all the virtuous victims is spot on.
But, Lydia… hmmm I wonder if we could get ABB to recreate the Groucho number on video with your words! I’m pretty sure that would be no problem at all for him!
Thank you so much, Mike! I loved writing this poem so much because the conceit gave me very free rein to diss any and all targets. Satire is fun.
I’d be thrilled if ABB were inclined to recreate the Groucho number — especially since he can do practically anything well. HOWEVER, there are two problems with that: First, I did not use the original E..Y. Harburg lyric pattern of meter and rhyme. So it would not fit to the original music. (I generally dislike simply rewriting the lyrics of existing songs and prefer to be “inspired by” rather than do a rewrite or parody song.) Second, I think the producers of the Marx Brothers film “At the Circus” would resent the copyright infringement of using their film for more than a de minimis “fair use” clip. In fact, MGM is now (sadly) owned by Amazon and the last thing I’d want to do is go up against those woke jerks with a legal issue. But it’s wonderful to dream. I would love to hear Groucho Marx performing my words. In fact, in my imagination, I already do!
Brian, your imagination makes ours sore and soar. You always amaze me with your subject selection and masterful abilities to put them into rhyming poems. Tattoos and piercings are two of my least favorite human activities and these delightful sketches are mindful of such personal choices. Your brand of humor is wonderful expressed.
Thank you so much, Roy! Boy, am I with you on the tattoo and piercings front. As I said in a previous comment, I’m perfectly content with what God gave me. I’ve never quite understood why other people feel the need to alter their appearance artificially (unless there is a deformity or injury that warrants intervention.) And there’s a strange psychological aspect as well — I’ve seen people become literally addicted to getting tattoos. I knew one fellow in L.A. — a reasonably young guy in his 30s — who was on social security and food stamps because he had a chronic illness. He didn’t have money to pay his rent or to buy food, but he proudly showed me the latest $200 tattoo he acquired when his social security check came in. That ain’t normal.
Brian, the tattoo poem looks like a rhyming romp for you, through whatever qualifies as entertainment. It’s a Hollywood piece (and a good one). I’m not surprised the tattoo addict you knew was in Los Angeles. In this general area, tattoos have crossed the line into normalcy–as long as it’s one, two, or a few. Piercings are less common than they once were, and still the way to go for a transgressive effect. But tattoos are acceptable, though some businesses require no tattoo visible while on the job. That requirement does not, however, forbid “permanent make-up,” which is in effect tattoo artistry on the face that looks like lipstick, eyeshadow, or blusher.
There’s still the question of motivation for persons with many tattoos. I know only one, who when asked about her most recent addition, said “it was so cute I just had to have it.” I could be wrong, but I think now she has chosen to become a Lydia, it is a matter of aesthetic collection. Other kinds of crazy collection, though, impinge on household storage space and personal finances, while tattooing ultimately wastes the health of the body. It’s an injury to get one, and another injury to attempt removal, which never restores the skin’s original condition. Dr. Tattoff has big business in California, with visible results that may require repeated treatments and ongoing care.
Thank you so much for reading and commenting, Margaret. “A rhyming romp…” That’s exactly what it was! I had a great deal of fun writing this piece for that very reason. The subject matter lent itself to allowing my imagination to run a bit wild.
Your discussion regarding motivation for persons with multiple tattoos is an intriguing one. I’m sure every single person asked about their “collection” would offer a different reason for it. But my theory is that people drawn to turn themselves into walking canvases of art are uncomfortable in their skin and, rather than seek a spiritual solution to that discomfort, opt for the “outside job” solution. It is much like people who become addicted to plastic surgery — also something I saw much of in Los Angeles. L.A. seems to be particular conducive to fixing the outsides rather than the soul-sickness on the inside because, as the center of the world’s film and television industry, it is something of a mecca for narcissists. I do not intend to sound dismissive of an entire region. I simply state my observations after having lived there for over 40 years.
Lydia, De-Tattooed Lady had me laughing out loud and enjoying the read over and over again. Brilliant poetry idea about an insane practice that goes along with nose, lip, tongue and nipple piercings. Thank you Brian for these fantastically funny lines.
Thank you so much, Norma! I’m so glad it got you laughing out loud. I had a blast writing it! And you’re so right about those weird piercings. Don’t forget belly buttons. And — not to get gross — I’ve heard tell of some more intimate piercings that make these other ones seem positively innocent.