CATCH
The river maiden calls
to me. The voice of an
angel, the trickery of a
sorceress, she guides me
to the depths of the river.
Sleepwalking under water
I become a fish and a
catch for someone’s menu.
I provide nourishment
when for years I had feelings
of lack of self-worth. To be
needed for once, I let it all
happen without knowing
I had fallen into a spell.
breaking all the hearts
staring off in the distance
and it’s always the wrong
song that comes on
an old lover leaving,
breaking all the hearts
and soon your demons
are in the corner
laughing
you can’t fool them
they know you aren’t cut
out for life in this world
and no matter how much
you try being positive
it will never work for
you
those hands will always
be around your neck
you will always be
pinned to the bathroom
floor at your grandmother’s
house
therapy never worked
the drugs never helped
and even alcohol has
turned a cold shoulder
thankfully, you know
a guy and you still can
find a vein
EVA’S LOCKET
Against her breast, she wears her dead grandfather.
Even now, she can’t help thinking of how he died,
shuffled into the steaming oven,
suffocated as stiff as her black shoes.
In mid-summer, she drinks hot black coffee
in an old suburban Chicago house.
How tight her collar buttons at the throat.
How sad the farewell that slips between her blouse and bra.
The chain is as long as a train with many windows.
The one face twists when she turns her head.
It’s a typical portrait of the time.
The eyes can stare at her but no way
that they can see what’s coming.
The locket is small, no longer shiny.
It’s been with her year after year,
a brush with darkness and with light.
It’s from a time when Europe looked elsewhere.
Or when blindness outflanked vision.
So many names her tongue could sanctify.
When it’s just the one, her silence is a beautiful thing.
SHE BLEEDS FOR BROOKLYN
Judge Burdon
She lives with low rent day dreams, on no name backstreets.
Dirty sidewalks made from quicksand concrete,
There’s no yellow brick road.
In this city like desert without an oasis.
Hope a disease that breeds in places,
Where God wouldn’t go.
In the air there’s a stench the smell of desperation.
And lives are stamped with a date of expiration.
The Devil’s grip on their souls.
Night crashes down with the sound of a train wreck.
She’s on the prowl for love and everyone’s suspect,
But they just leave her cold.
She cries with a sound that no one hears.
Her eyes lost their voice
Now she can’t speak with tears
She wonders ’bout life on the other side of the mirror.
Kneels down for one more unanswered prayer.
But there’s no one listening out there!
And she bleeds, she bleeds for Brooklyn
She’s hemorrhaging lies and alibis.
She bleeds, she bleeds for Brooklyn.
Break free Persephone
Brooklyn left the front porch light on.
MY SIBLINGS’ FATHER
Judge Burdon
other children feared monsters
under their bed
i feared the one living under our roof.
his hair was nimbus black
with a storm’s thunder in his voice.
his fists were freight train brown
ball bearing knuckles
frostbite blue was his touch
with empty icebox eyes
his smile untrusted growling words
spoken like tangled spaghetti
he was my mother’s husband
my siblings’ father
a childhood of baseballs never thrown
bruises and shattered bones
medicated with lies
happiness diluted with tears
in a house with screams undetected
when asked what i wanted to be
i testified “far from here”
now, fiber optic home front news
faceless words
cancer eating away at your life
with the fury of a piranha
your disease now my champion
fighting with the courage
i was unable to muster
your epitaph written in my adolescence
while plotting your midnight homicide
again you leave unaccountable for your actions
i’m left to wrestle with the demons
not the strength to forgive
my memory too scarred to forget
i’ll keep the battle lines drawn as your monument
let the puzzle piece fall where it may
good bye old man you’ll be missed
like a pit viper’s bite
your pain can no longer touch me
from the grave.
I Do Not Know What You Are Thinking
By
Grant Guy
She said
I don’t know what you are thinking
You do not talk to me
I said
I do not know what I am thinking
I do know what I am feeling
I cannot put feelings into words
She said
That is no way to talk to your lover
I said
I do not know what love is
“Bad Hair Day”
By Lloyd Bailey
The corridors seem distant, seem darker.
There are no bright countenances.
The morning hues are haunted and hostile.
Where have all my friends wandered?
Anger and aggression have replaced harmony.
It invades my R.E.M.
turning my morning wood
into pallid putty;
this is no way to meet the day…
I splash cold water on my face,
but the mirror doesn’t change.
It’s in the eyes
that never wash away.
The fresh air inhales stale,
ominous clouds dim the sun.
I squint my eyes still.
I’ve gone searching for my friends.
I’m looking for what I lost.
“Working for the Man Sucks!”
By Lloyd Bailey
Like a bullhorn he bellows,
“Before ye boys breach my domain,
with your bad manners and boisterous ways,
I require an inspection from coiffure to boot tips
beginning with crop, parted firmly down leftern crown,
countenances scrubbed squeaky,
eyes forward and determined,
and chin bare of whiskers.”
Now he marches up and down the line,
making adjustments,
“You sir, cannot enter my kitchen
until you starch that collar.
You, tighten up that shirt bottom.
You look bloated about your belly.
You, boy, unbuckle that belt. You’ve missed a loop in the back.
Good Christ man, you consider those pants creased?
They’re flat as a flapjack. Invest in an iron immediately.
Pull up that pant leg, sir. I suspect a sockless wonder.
What’s this? Ankle socks? You, sir, are not your sister.
Calf high gentlemen and colored black.
Now fetch your eyes fellows
and follow this man’s shoe shine”
He bends over and picks some biscuit in the reflection,
And continues,
“You, separate six dozen eggs.
You, take the whites, turn them into mayonnaise.
Make it tight.
You, make the yolks into hollendaise.
Snap to it boys. I haven’t got all day.”
As he marches through his office door,
counting,
“1,2,3,4. 1,2,3,4.”
“Bellow the Bowery off the Commons”
By Lloyd Bailey
Front porch a veritable ashtray,
wooden steps a smoker’s playground
of used butts and char black burns,
ash flakes reign everything.
Men speckle stoop sipping coffee,
thousand yard stares,
scattered “yeps” and “uh-huhs,”
foot shufflings and watch checkings.
Ruby sun in western purple sky
intimates time.
Tobacco rich air permeates the room –
that pungent after smoke stench –
wares heavy on the place
with a thick black coffee aftertaste.
Pensive is the mood
as eye contacts are made,
and head nods are had.
(Donuts sit stale in a box.)
After serenity is granted
everyone settles in
for the long haul.
Experience, strength, and hope
is the message.
New comers are most important,
but none are present.
This is no place for amateurs;
this meeting is not en vogue.
Gravely voices prevail.
Five o’clock shadows
are warranted.
You get two minutes.
Then shut up.
Sip, don’t slurp,
lest you relish the stink eye.
Holding hands is forbidden,
same goes for shoulder wraps.
When it’s time
stand up, bow your head, and clasp your fingers.
Now recite the “Lord’s Prayer.”
Outside it’s cool, freshing, and dark
save for firefly glows of cigarette tips.
The evening is cathartic.
Men wait to be delivered.
Someone suggest more
coffee and donuts
at a diner
down the street.
Most everyone migrates.
No one wants to be alone,
not at time like this.
His Soul Was Operated On
By
Grant Guy
His soul was operated on in 1998
He no longer needed it & had it extracted
He had not loved since 1971
He gave up on man & the world in 1972
When God’s roof caved in on him
He gave up on God in 1963
He could have ended it all
Jumping on the Disraeli Bridge
in the Fall of 1949
None of that was good enough
Better to be a thorn in the side of the world
Yes he decided
Except he did in a cholera outbreak
In the summer of 1903
so this is love
by
Grant Guy
the twilight zone of love
i don’t want it
you can keep
put it in your pipe
& smoke it
dump the ashes in the ashtray of blues
what good is love in the twilight zone of love
compost
