Are There Any
Questions?
I was hungry
for god & I swallowed
Her earring.
Sweat got on everything.
The couple
still french-kisses long in the driveway of the church.
The windows,
lit up at night: black sky, tangerine hills.
Darkness has
its good points.
Haughty, god
delivers me another drink
On a silver
tray with a little cold sandwich,
He knows I
won’t eat.
The lovers
fell. The linen of their parachutes
Entangled in
Williamstown. error 404 Not Found.
Justice for
Fat Daddy murdered by
Narcotics strike
force. 215-313-9506.
They are falling
still. In a world of 10,000 objects.
Blame wind.
The ground fluttered. Blame dance.
Small souls
lift into soft trees.
Opaque, watermelon
dusk.
I kiss you
like a paycheck.
Man whispers
something (opium?)
To woman on
bench.
Koran pattern
on his tie.
So, now, a
bird calls, in the realm,
Though some
would say I do not hear it.
Scrubbing pans,
polishing silver. Brushing shoes.
Between the
leaves. Purifying the forest.
Crow snicker,
car approaching & going away.
errata
Nothing that
had ever made so much sense.
Errors that
failed to be caught in proof.
Something seemed
obedient, about right here.
Nestled its
head against this dumb boy’s
Heart.
I know because
I went & sat under the
American sky
& didn’t talk for a while.
Reading Circle Jerk
My neighbor’s weed whacker goes gold. I like the irony, melting, in late afternoon light.
I’m knocking back shots of tequila & tonic. He’s snapping off chicken heads with an ax,
Vacuuming leaves with his other hand. Should I pay attention? Butterflies & moths lift
into the trees.
I’m reading Proust. I’m leafing through Marquez’ stuff. Do I believe it?
I’m up to page 139 of a Chandler
novel. You know, where the equivalent of the blonde
goddess
Who is trouble but can’t spell it (& I trust about as far as I
can throw my car), distractedly
enters,
Creaking like plastic upholstery. Simultaneously, my son decides is a good time to
quietly
Blow up a brown paper bag & explode it. Laugh, go ahead, he’s gunning for you too.
How Ulysses ends, I can’t say. No, I can’t say. No I can’t.
Isabella, my calico,
Settles in the tenderness of low lamp & my lap. Morning is a movie in her memory,
With its fragrance of wharves & woodsmoke. Are those two nude women , coiled
Across the alley, trying to tell me something? One, reading a book whose title I can’t make out,
A gelatin nude photograph on the jacket. The other, white knuckling a copy of Mein
Kampf,
Absentmindedly tracing a pink aureole with her free hand. I love the odor of pages, new &
yellowed, equally.
Copyright
© Leonard Gontarek, 2008
