New poem: THE COSBY POEM

ONE
after the topsoil of alleged drugs,
alleged rape of unconscious victims,
and the awakenings and discoveries,
we now dig into the next level
of celebrity sediment:
talent and modeling agencies
supplying bodies to use-and-discard,
plus employees to run celebrity errands--
hold the great man's cigar
block the dressing room door
when "interviews" take place
find housing for mistresses
keep the great man's name
off the checks and money orders
excitement wears off
and the weariness of doing grubby chores
then the fear of being fired
by the no-longer-great man who once gave you
a personally signed photo
TWO
I HATE TO ASK THIS, BUT I HAVE TO!
SAY IT AIN'T SO, BILL!
repeated by nervous interviewers
on separate occasions
as Bill scowls and thunders:
SCUTTLE THIS, CUT THAT!
YOU SHOULD KNOW YOU'RE
NOT PRACTICING JOURNALISM!
DON'T MAKE ME CALL MY ATTORNEYS!
THREE
enjoyed the first BILL COSBY SHOW
with Bill as easygoing coach Chet Kincaid
as well as the first two or three years
of THE COSBY SHOW
before it grew smug and self-satisfied
liked to go to the Playboy Jazz Festival
when Cosby was the MC
and admired what he did for jazz
at the festival and on TV as well
fast-forward a few years
to when Ennis Cosby was murdered
and I gave money to the HELLO FRIEND charity
formed in his memory
cut to a few years later,
when Bill Cosby had his
maybe-or-maybe-not daughter
(by a woman who wasn't his wife Camille)
jailed for extortion
that was cold, I thought
even colder when Plutocrat Bill
started telling poor and middle-class people
IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT
AND YOUR KIDS ARE
KNUCKLEHEADS TOO!
way too frigid for me--
and for Hannibal Buress too
FOUR
someday, I'll be tempted to watch Bill Cosby
in something he acted in three to four decades ago
or revisit an old stand-up routine on YouTube
and I'll try to compartmentalize
he could be a fine actor and funny storyteller
when he wasn't preoccupied
with grinding people's lives
into topsoil

Justin Bieber's entourage-enabled behavior--and a similar incident I once witnessed.

http://www.nme.com/news/justin-bieber/71375?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=crowdsurfers

What the Justin Bieber urination incident (topped with a chaser of Bill Clinton abuse) teaches:
if you're a young male star with a young male entourage in tow, everything you do is cool.

About 23 years ago, I was an extra (hired, but not used that day) on a critically-acclaimed film noir partially shot at an old, ornate apartment building in L.A.'s Wilshire District.  Nearby was a storage area, where the Young Male Star and friends practiced throwing a football at a glass window.  Presumably it was a game to see how to throw the football at the window without causing breakage.

Eventually, an older man came out and told the Young Male Star and his friends to stop.  They stopped.

I saw this and kept silent; I didn't want to lose a day's pay and be blackballed from the casting agency who sent me on the job.

And, in retrospect, the Young Male Star (now middle-aged and still active in films) was blessed with living in a time where cell phones were few and primitive--and tabloid TV hadn't evolved (or devolved) into the TMZ era.