Wall Street Poet Michael Silverstein's Satirical Verse

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Wall Street Poet
Michael Silverstein's
Satirical Verse

A Dyspeptic's Guide To Contemporary American Politics (In Verse)

"Nowadays, you can't turn on the TV without some talking head telling you about the economy. Yet, in a world overrun by 'analysts,' only one man has the guts, the brains, and, quite frankly, the poetry to put it all in perspective.That man is Michael Silverstein... Silverstein is a true intellectual." — Gersh Kuntzman, The New York Post

"Few people have found much to laugh about in the stock market this year. Michael Silverstein is the exception. The Bard of the Bourse can find humor in losing money, globalization and stock options." — USA Today

More Of What The Critics Are Saying
About Silverstein's Verse

America’s best-loved poem during the 19th century wasn’t written by Longfellow or Whitman or Bryant or Emerson. It came from the pen of an unsuccessful printer and publisher named Samuel Woodworth (1784-1842). His poem, "The Old Oaken Bucket," was memorized by literally millions of his countrymen.

Why such popularity for a ditty of no discernible literary worth? Probably because it tapped into a longing for a disappearing lifestyle. Nineteenth century America, though still largely agrarian, was fast going urban and industrial. A lot of folks caught up in this transition liked to look back and take a sentimental view of their farming childhoods, when a summer drink from an oak bucket dipped into a well of cool clear water was a thing of joy—at least in retrospect. Of course, as many of the people who have parodied this poem (and there have been many) have rightly noted, the slops bucket was more a feature of these ‘good old days’ than the water bucket .

My own parody of "The Old Oaken Bucket" also takes a sentimental (and highly distorted) view of times past—times when markets and economies were more stable, some older investors continue to believe, because currencies and values generally were linked to precious metals. My verse is called "Those Old Golden Ducats."

Those Old Golden Ducats

I fondly remember an earlier era
When shiny gold coins were well hid ‘neath my floor.
The eagle, the rooster, the sovereign, the panda,
I squirreled them there so I’d never feel poor.
If stock markets tanked I’d just smirk at the panic,
Inflation-swamped bonds made me chortle with glee.
A country defaulted, investors went manic,
But I had my ducats, it never touched me.
Those old golden ducats, those precious bright nuggets,
Financial worlds shook but it never touched me.

On long winter nights I took out my gold treasures
And sprinkled them freely o’er pillow and sheets
Then rolled amidst coins that gave me kinky pleasures
The kind you don’t get from T-bills or from REITs.
For what is an asset that’s nothing but paper?
A government’s promise, a company’s plea,
Whose worth swings each time they devise a new caper
Unlike my gold ducats, whose worth ne’er did flee.
Those old golden ducats, those precious bright nuggets,
Financial worlds shook but it never touched me.

Now times they have changed and uncertainty risen
As metals most precious have lost their cache.
With currencies sprung from their hard asset prison
It’s markets not metals that have final say.
All money is funny, and central banks love it
They set true worth’s compass, they’re happy, they’re free!
Alas in my mattress, my lumpy life savings,
Are shriv’ling away, oh woe, woe is me!
Those old golden ducats, my less precious nuggets,
Financial worlds changed—and it sure has touched me.

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