Our latest assignment in the poetry class I’m taking was to get a tabloid newspaper, and write something inspired by one of the articles. Imagine the backstory. See where it takes you.

The Weekly World News ran an article about the Man in the Moon being a peeping tom, and I wrote the following:

The Man in the Moon is a Peeping Tom
Weekly World News
January 27, 2008

He watches, coldly, calmly,
as Maureen rises in the night
to bake cookies.
The soft white dough mixes
smoothly in the bowl.
He can almost taste the chocolate chips,
almost smell the rich brown aroma, as the oven
eclipses them.

Sees in through another window
the water swirling down the drain,
the steam rising
softly into the
moonlit night.
Janet caresses her lean,
milky white thighs,
gently rolling them
in bread crumbs for the potluck on Sunday.

Dr. Alfred Eisenstone,
of the Bowl Mountain Observatory
says he’s been watching
the phases and the faces of the lunar disc
night upon night,
these many years,
the 200-inch telescope
trained on the sky,
seeing what the moon sees,
urging the people of Flagstone
to pull their shades of a full moon.

And there’s Robert,
out on the deck to grill
a late-night burger, juicy
and dripping, as he takes
a long pull from the forbidden
beer, when he’s sure nobody
is watching.

Far above Flagstone,
Dr. Alfred is vigilant.
He knows what the man
in the moon is up to.
He’s collecting evidence,
planning for his tell-all
scientific paper.

He counts chocolate chips,
his knuckles as white
as the moon.