Recovery Sunday (5 July 2009)
July 4th found me watching paddleboats scream
at the sight of large posteriors. I ran in fear
from croquet balls, approaching rednecks, Roman candles
flexing their pectorals. I plead, “I need to garden. Yes, in yours.”
Hand off the pungently lemon, nasty OFF
Spray’d baby, a noxious garnish to the Sangria.
I can already hear the water-cooler bubbling,
overhung Monday, “That’s when she offered me
her two twelve-year-old girls. ‘They have great doweries.’”
Ghoulishly digging among neglected flower beds,
I am trying to scare you,
the Pimm’s cups, and gravity bongs away.
The hot dogs lurch toward my stomach from the grill.
I could lick the sweat off your spine to get high.
She would have watermelon seeds dripping down her chinny chin.
Sousa nostalgia wafts over the smell of sweet burns, skin,
fat women sink into the Boston sounds.
Kudos referred to her shoes as “the getting laid Chuck Norris’s.”
She laughs at his knock-off Kicks (he’s penniless as Charon at first crossing).
When the plate of melon passed she felt her mouth fill
with boiling water. She spit out stars.
“I’m already too memorable to warrant a nickname.”
Thumper would tear you in two, I thought
watching bleached hand-me-down
wife-beaters chase one another, shriek, “Come on! Pants me!”
One nearly lights his sister’s (rayon) tube top
with a sparkler. She shifts, cradles the bottle
of vodka against her distant-most (silicone) breast and hisses.
She will not worry about the fire.
“What can you catch on your tongue?” comes from
the other side of the tree. El jardin explotar y su captura.
Stranger’s fingertips on soft hairs rang bells in her ears.
I cannot understand his tense
shoulders, sentences in knots—
the adjectival construct of love always falls flat.
The plastic butterfly took wing and landed on the clothesline.
But that was of course after the whiskey
lit its fourth joint.
I was so hungry I cried, my pink bread
cried strawberry jam, I burnt my tongue.
The singing tooth has lost its voice—
she demonstrated poise, a boulder sealed her mouth closed.
I watched fireworks in her sunglasses’ reflection
she looked like she wept bloody rainbows,
Her eyebrows said, “Hurry before you get caught!”
The party feared her overlarge potatoes would explode.
My drink tasted like the waves sounded, distant
yellow threes add up to greens. Grassy margaritas.
Hands indulge in the brisk bitter tang,
our efforts to contact the dead. 1812 overtures of key parties,
“Mary said it wasn’t me. She said your bedroom.”
(She actually had said she sadly had to leave, happily
to fuck her spouse.) But you have your pick of the ghosts of patriots past
making the migration home with startled umbrellas.
The other side of the river, where everyone knows the best views
allow for enough space to learn to lick your elbow.
Uncle Sam’s suspenders smile upon his friends.
+
we all pseudo-obeyed the *20 lil’ poetry projects form to get our minds extra surreal-rolling. not that we needed much help. july 5th people. owie. ginger ale! i of course molded/molested/altered and combined/recombined— and in general got your suggestions/quotes drunk. and here they are— the cast list, this poem was writ and inspired from/with donations of verse/debauch from the following fabulous folks:
@waltersickert, @armyoftoys, @persephassa, @teruterukama, @sinxkitten, @cabaret_kitty, @drauh, @mergyeugnau, @shakti672, @wigglewarily, @one_bloody_poet
thank you guys. i will get to work on creating something ziney/arty to commemorate/propagate this project!