Apéritif

   

Great art is inspired

by the sub-conscious,

she nonchalantly mused,

lying naked on

the pink comforter,

sipping Pastis and water,

head propped on her palms,

a tiny glowing sphinx,

reading poems

with Cleopatra lips.

I half listen,

knowing the words,

knees at her waist,

molding child-like

cleavages with id,

tracing illusions in

firm, tan sand of spine.

Clue

                    

The mysteries and, of course, the murder

are all revealed in a parchment envelope

marked ‘Confidential’

and placed beside Mr. Boddy

along with his deceased wealth of knowledge

in the cellar.

Professor Plum, noted metaphysician,

sipping sherry in the conservatory

points out that we see only the tip

of the iceberg and miss the berg.

It’s there in the brain, filtered,

unintegrated.

Colonel Mustard belting single malt,

his seed larger than

the kingdom of Heaven,

is preoccupied in the billiard room

with the hiked skirt of Miss Scarlet

who leans into a massé shot,

reflectively pointing out that,

reality only exists when

it bumps into another reality.

The colonel in a whiskey rasp retorts

Poppycock, balderdash, it’s all just

deductive reasoning,

Mr. Green is sure that matter

is mostly empty, fluffed probability,

more like thought than thing,

and that the government knows all

but refuses to tell,

at least this generation.

Mrs. Peacock practicing saying

Good evening in the mirror

says that she can prove it

if we join her in the library

and that the height of arrogance

is creating God in your own image.

Mrs. White, busy inspecting

the table settings in the dining room,

is convinced that while there is no

out there out there independent of in here,

her main concern is that no one suspects

her of stealing the small shampoos and lotions.

Interview in a Bar

  

To extend life

is to multiply death,

he postured his Guinness

in front of his lips,

but did not sip.

You don’t sleep do you?

It goes unnoticed though

like your contempt for food

and conversation.

You sit here sober

but see a different room,

only you hear the rats,

their disease infecting

shadows, scattering scared

through the walls.

In your nips of dream

you’re catatonic

in silent coma,

skin grey like the fog,

serpents eat monkeys as

you walk uneven stairs

to a granite landing,

the moon is the

color of lava,

the sun in your belly

burns your eyes,

reddens the night,

jeopardizes the stars.

Library before dawn

It is still, all asleep,

Cabernet relaxes against the glass.

The books facing me

remind me of the girls,

dresses all different colors,

lined up across the hall at

CYO dances, facing the boys,

standing straight, short and tall,

giving a certain flavor

and aroma to the room,

while waiting to be chosen.

Full of words, but too shy

to speak aggressively -

always the whispering though

as now the shelves

begin to faintly vibrate.

Dorothy Parker quietly denigrating

Pound about his politics,

Pastan to Dickinson about the

economy of her pain and

Plath very low to Sexton

on the craft of death.

I vaguely make out Eliot

criticizing my choice of wine

when Whitman hushes them all

and wants to get back to the

slow-dancing of teenage boys,

first gropes to ‘Wonderland by Night’ -

comparing it to my handling

of their volumes and my occasionally

taking them individually to the car

apparently for closer inspection.