the burlesque poetess(s)

poem-a-day week17 “subdued ‘morse code’ section between the verse and the chorus”

August 23-29, 2010 week17: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
http://locksmithy.livejournal.com/tag/poem-a-day
http://poetesss.tumblr.com/PAD

118. August 28, 2010 (sat. New Blood ORG, cloud club)

Cleverly parking
Below piano factory
Balconies, cops and

Construction to seduce
Me away from the cookies
Spose i can learn you

Some Ziggy in the extra
Courtyard mossy “green room” rail
-ing propping journal

i swear i do other things
Than sit on stone benches
Making neanderthal spark starts

A capella “Mein Herr”
Summons the off duty
Emcee down from cloud

i’m just stoked to be
At a garden salon, biting
Off lyrics, bantering by tiki light

http://youtube.com/user/tinyrevue

i’m rah-ther proud of this week-in-verse, i hope you enjoy!
the rest of the poems li(v)e below!

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for @nilesz & all my new stranger followerrrs

i don’t know where on earth you new foll’s came from, but i’m so grateful! you are brief fireflies of quick flickering personality to me. i don’t know you (yet) - i’d like to. this poem seems appropriate to that sentiment. (oh, wait a tick- is it because of recommendations to the tumblr ‘creative writing’ directory? do feel free to » suggest poetesss.tumblr!)

This is in our around Boston
aka: pray we’ve got bikes in common (2010 v.)

inspired from ‘missed connections’ on Craigslist

.

You said I was safe now,
a brie wheel peeking plough
side out of your black
messenger bag. I put my palm
over my locket and continued
watching the band through the sea
of cell phone cameras’
viewfinders.

.

The wait at the T made my pomp
-adour sag. My night sucked-
circumstances of lust beyond
my handicapped stall control. But
you were the one
crying on the green line,
your wet collar made me wish for sun.

.

You could be my dear
deportee spouse! Sweet
accentless letters, X’s
crossing paths (unlike our feet).
And O’s licked, pressed with my
full weight upon the envelope
tightly sealing my wait
for your reply.

.

The rain must’ve obscured
my smile. You abandoned your
wind-ravaged blue umbrella and me.
Only your donation to the sidewalk
constellation of gum proved
you were there. I’d whispered
“You know, once this was a virgin
stoop.” Maybe in the drizzle
my smile seemed a leer?

.

I forgot to signal
my left hand turn- distracted
by your silver helmet
and copper ponytailed hair.
I wanted to tie it
in a knot and watch it burn.

Do you play catch at yellow lights?
I’m sorry to pry, I can get out
of the passenger seat if I try.
The ratio is a brief
case in Boston, pray
we’ve got bikes
in common.

.

I peeked at the ice cream brand
you were buying, sweetie. Just
so you can identify yourself,
your vanilla sky
I want to be trying.
You bring the nonfat Cool Whip,
less sticky on t-shirt sheets,
spankings.

.

You were soliciting
money for some forest
warped redwood charity.
My cheeks flamed and
my pace quickened even
as my hand found a dollar
in my crotch pocket.

I didn’t donate, and now
your dimples won’t let me rest.

.

No— you collected me like spare
change on the corner
the white discman made me
think you were a foreigner.

.

Your robot switch
tattoo on your wrist
made me gulp.

W4M M4W W4W M4W ?4?
Message me if you miss
sharing Burt’s Bees
on our knocked
about teeth. We can kiss til’
the next train comes.

by your poetesss, jojo lazar
photo credits to deviantART : 1, 2, 3
+

a belated poem for Niles of the Atari Wallet empire & more. we had a conversation where i admitted back in college i wrote some shattered sonnets in part lifted tidbit/niblets/inspired by the Missed Connections section of Craigslist. i was going to just x-post the thing from yet another poetry livejournal circa 2004 but ended up…revising it. it’s true about going back and reworking old work throughout one’s writerly career. i went through a whole patch in 06 where i “performed lipo/plastic surgeries” upon my morbidly bad freshman-in-college poems and turned it into tighter pieces i was really proud of. oh, it’s so much fun to revise with distance! i’m not being remotely sarcastic. ok, cheeky :)

ok new readers, feel free to comment/introduce yourself, i may write you your own poem-commission in the future iffun i know you. really.

20. for @jkernohan about his wife

shall I believe that unsubstantial death is amorous?

Take a wife! Choose from these caskets
three, as Shakeshaft (Spear? was it?)
would have you. A promise of treasure
beneath these X’s of nails through
lacquered wood, the weight and wait for lady,
dirt. You’ll fantasize, choose the body
you’ll kiss to life. Who’s redwood nails
will rake your ribs?

Elsewise you’ll wish you’d paid
for a butt donut in your old age,
watching Act V at The Globe
alone. Could Romeo hurry up, die already?
Juliet’s lids and thighs are trembling.

So take a smart fair thing of a wife, a sprite
to bring you refreshing drink and drown
your sorrows in a hot sake bath. If she displeases
you send her to the crick with a song of flowers.
Women look so lovely as they drift
with swamp topknots in their hair,
that mud-in the gills colouring.
Keep her around to bury
your face in her unleavened breasts.

You can take weekend trips to regions far,
wide and coastal. Compete in counting
seasides! Tell your wife her eyes
are the breakers on your eyes— being jagged
rocks. Or don’t say anything
that could be misinterpreted like that.
Read to her from Titus Andronicus
a little while she reclines on a wicker
chaise lounge avec various quelques choses
(bonbons, aspirin, bonbons dosed with aspirin)
no excuses for her pretty head come bedtime!

O! The rose looks fair, but fairer we spleen
For that sweet odour, which doth in it live—
or squat, anyway. The canker blooms have full
as deep a dye as the perfumed acupuncturist
who blushes as she applies cups and pricks…

Beloved, let me bed you, and treat you
to a spa treatment. I’ll read Shakespeare.

+

by your poetess(s), jojo lazar.

forgive the morbidity so close to Hellentine’s Day. or don’t. i like how Shakeshaft has some of the quicksilveriest gender dynamics in his work. i don’t know what kind of voice this turned out to be, hopefully mr. @jkernohan will take it in jest, (in jest, poison!) the only explanation i have is that the phrase “take a wife!” was ringing in my ears when i set down to write this. the title is from (no surprise) Act V of R+J and the photo manip is from (this Tudor stuff blog). i am not entirely satisfied with this, i want to write more morbid Shakeshaft’s womens’ deaths-related stanzas, but i promised to keep this tumblr an honest first draft space, so i want people to know that this is the beginning of a long road of editing for me, this is how it usually starts. and if you guys enjoy/see promise in these, that’s awesome. thank you.

in other amazing news today, miss edrie as artist-in-residence over at HiLoBrow.com interviewed me and showcased every sort of variety of my work. if that’s how some of you fair new readers got here, welcome welcome welcome! tell others to follow this tumblr and become my fan » on facebrain! (http://bit.ly/FBpoetess)

I *heart* Burlesque Poetess by edrie broken toy
—-> http://hilobrow.com/2010/02/15/burlesquepoetess/

13. for maya in VT

The open sea

sirens are but harlots, coral polyps, Penelopes—
they unwind sailors
Doric columns, claw drawstrings,
lick briny brows, bind
loose scalp with seaweed, so much trouble
to dash open
upon the rock for a honeymoon—
vests destroyed by driftwood
repaired avec venomous needles,
taut threads of shrieks—
seagulls’ diamond eyes smash
soft-shelled creatures’ hearts
against cliff-faces— kiss purple urchin
lips, sea slugs—slags bury beaks
in callused palms, suck gold garnet rings off
bloated fingers, salt-swelled codpieces
make sirens smile— with all the charm
             of a fish-head, twisted fins still attached
             curved like the contended spine
             of a lover, or like the lover’s smile
             itself before it breaks
             on the shore

by your poetesss, j.m. lazar

7. for @sandykidd & @metafrantic

i was told to write a poem for both members of this dynamic duo. at one point i was even told to include sand! when they introduced themselves at the amanda palmer signing-line 2 sundays ago (after twitter-requests) i decided to give them an alt. reality/faux wedding toast to be surreal, since, after all, i’d just met them.

to-day i did some spelunking of their mind-boggling genre-bending monthly magazine » Crossed Genres, so it seems only fitting that i wrote a monologue/poem of fantasy/magical realism but prob’ly just that genre known as— drunky groomsman! so, it is performative silly. enjoy. i am so glad to have made such wonderful new friendfans.

+

A particular pair of trees waking up against the window.
This partnership of mind, and always now
in want of forgiveness… (Josh Beckman)

Let me not to the marriage of two minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken,
It is the star to every wandering bark… (Billy Shakeshaft)

The lifeguards do too good a job,
we think we are immortal. (moi)

Wedding Toast / that never was

Peony portholes. Confectionary piracy?
Surely this is the best reception theme yet!
Raise your white wine from the Dead
Sea. Toast these two!
I’m your first mate, here to gag—
(is this Pacific Ocean absinthe?)
Hear me tell you I love
each and every one of my friends’
origin myths. But this couple’s
sloop has the best manifesto:
No sea-hominid left behind.
They met— The scene— The beach.
They meet— she, shakes
pixie stick sand out
of her pincers, though I could not
tell you how. He follows the caw—
seagull cacophony to this scene,
is he suspicious? Is she the culprit
cook that thought it’d be clever to start
salting the seas in the first place?
(Hawaiian wormwood, you say?)
No, this guy’s rarely supposed
he ought be suspicious.
He’s an angel, bordering on angelfish,
this guy. His hair— electric—
abalone. He’s got a halo
like the mother of fucking pearl
detailing around guitars’ soundholes.
He’s all fins and wings, on all fours
digging her out of the sound—
a steady maracas pulse, flung sand.
She accompanies his song on
abandoned plastic shovel and they
free her other half.

The lady fiddler crab lost
without instrument case.
A romance the stuff of fishnets
and half-hitch love knots.
We know these lovers won’t devour
one another with lemon and garlic salt
any time soon.

3. diet coke (exploded haiku) for bridget

Aspartame

wake me sweetly with
that cold aluminum kiss
on my forehead
beads of anticipation
beneath that pull
tab, the curve of your
lower lip

if i beg and fiddle
long enough you’ll tell me
the initials of my one day
beloved and when i look into my palm
at your silver charm— i’ll know
it’s true by the butterfly
fizz in my stomach