Kkk (?) Poem by Jim Yerman

Bryan’s torch story is finished as is Ali’s blue hair tale of woe.
But we have three children which means we still have one to go.

Today it’s Ryan’s turn who while sitting in our front yard
Innocently got in trouble for his love of baseball cards.

He had a card collection and his friends Jared and Gary had one too
“Hey Guys, ” Ryan announced one day, “Here’s what we’re going to do.

“We’ll find out who else loves baseball cards here in our neighborhood
And get them all together to form a baseball card brotherhood.

We’ll get all our friends to join us, it really won’t be tough
We’ll have meetings, make club ‘T’ shirts and all cool kinds of stuff.”

They mentioned the club to Deborah and I, we gave it our OK
We smiled at their resourcefulness, and the club was on it’s way.

We let them handle everything, we thought the experience would be great
We let them plan the entire thing and their own card club create.

They worked hard together...yes those three boys got on a role
In retrospect perhaps we should have exerted some control.

They watched a lot of TV, yes they were young but they were wise
For they knew the best way to get the word out would be to advertise.

So they made a bunch of fliers announcing the Kard Kingdom Kids club and hey!
To make it attract attention they decided every word would start with K.

Then these three young budding capitalists on this point all agreed
They’d abbreviate it for their friends and make it easier to read.

They designed their own club fliers and on an entrepreneurial whim
Decided to use Jared’s dad’s printer unbeknownst to him.

Yes, every mailbox in the neighborhood got one of their fliers that day
Announcing, come to our house for the next meeting of the KKK!

We were proud of Ryan, Jared and Gary as we watched their confidence soar
That is until the policeman came knocking at our door.

Apparently one nosy neighbor, the kind always looking out for sin
Saw the KKK was meeting at our house and quickly called it in.

“I applaud your children’s ingenuity, ” the policeman chuckled, “But there is one little flaw,
They’re frightening your neighbors...and it seems they broke the law.”

“I realize your neighbor is something of a quack
So don’t worry we won’t be pressing charges as long as you get these fliers back.”

“By the way as a father myself I understand, ” he said, after the kids had been dispersed,
“But wouldn’t it have been smarter if you both had read this first.”

We thanked the nice policeman, and apologized for our disregard
As we tried to hide the white sheets they put out to display their cards!

We helped them retrieve every flier, then told them of the KKK
And how it’s illegal to open other people’s mailboxes...on this or any day.

Who knew a tiny neighborhood baseball card club would end up being so judicial
Just because three young boys used incorrect initials.

So there you have it, the story of how innocence got in the way
When our son Ryan and his two close friends almost enrolled in the KKK.