~*~
INDUCIVE OF SWOON
*a poem for Kristy Bowen's poems*
She bobs for apples in a pig trough
full of spoiled milk. Her soiled Victorian-style lace
catches on tiny hooks, exposing her wrists.
A rusty hum in her throat.
A bloody burr in her throat.
An odd contraption to winnow her throat.
Pink layer cake. Topped by a silver swan
fashioned from tinfoil, glove buttons for eyes.
When she cries, her beauty mark is smudged
and the milky whiteness sullies.
Violets wilt upon dusty doilies.
Minnows out of bowls do a death dance.
She sneaks hard liquor in the spit valve
of her clarinet. That's why she joined the band.
For spirits, ruffles, shared breathing space
with the tarnished, elephantine shape of the tuba.
After practice, the pale girls separate themselves
and swoon under streetlights, unaware
of the power of their wombs, the way their pelvic girdles sway.
Under ambiguous moonlight, exposing their wrists.
A black dog shudders in a ditch.
They practice their pitch in the dark.
She lines her empty shoebox with velvet
before she places the wounded sparrow inside.
She thinks of him as damaged vowels;
feeds him cryptic worms and communion hosts. If he dies,
she will paint his shivery bones with honey;
extend her sticky-webbed palms and dance alone
in a distorted jukebox glow. She'll hum along;
subvert the words to 'Gory, gory hallelujah'.
Hat pins pricking out the black netting of her mourning millinery.
Hat pins clamped betwixt her lips. Exposing her wrists.
A clawfooted bathtub will soon overflow with rosewater.
She pretends to be a schoolgirl with red knee socks
reading her primer, spine knobby but straight.
She pretends to be a strict schoolmarm, slightly wicked.
She administers another hairbrush spanking
to her broken doll who blurts, 'mum, mum, mum',
then sputters out...
Imagine the scene just moments before her head breaks
the surface. She could be bleeding, she could be rose
petal scented, she could be nuzzled by grubby snouts,
she could be curdling, she could be sucking down worms.
She could be playing her clarinet in fits & starts.
Listen to the frisson-esque strains of her
reed instrument in the dark. She knows what lurks
in tenebrous cocoons and she knows how to woo it
with wrists exposed and cooing. Innominate
bones and bruised apples. Stiff slugs of velvet.
Even when tipsy and twisty, she knows
the difference between plastic and flesh.
~*~
Frankenstein Crowned Miss South Dakota
Bruises galore, my crown is implanted into place.
My smile fakes itself amidst the grotesque putty
of crusty contusions and misshapen lumps.
This fiendish prank (that was my face)
has mutated into a gory game;
a multi-tiered charade of ruined cakery,
rancid frosting, mottled pigmentation.
Wobbly high heels jammed on skewed digits
(jellied pigs' feet seeping from hacked decapitation).
Busting out of my evening gown, I'm the barnyard star
of this maggoty parade. I'm the tainted creamsicle unfrozen;
oozing all over your plate. Poisoning your meat & potatoes
with my scintillating slimy pate.
FREAKY BITCH stamped on my sash,
on my slit, on my slash-worthy flesh.
I am sent down the stage with a clusterfuck--
dead dahlias, belladonnas, spider mums.
I am dragged down the dirty alley with a chain
attached to the back of a pick-up truck.
I'm wearing my bathing suit and gelatinous feet.
I'm bleeding through the crotch as zirconium flies off
my tiara and then you want me to compete
in the talent display. You want to gawk
and squirm your hoggish trouser worm
as I blend my piecemeal heart into
a gruesome shimmy shimmy shake.
(title appropriated from a Headlines comedy segment on 'The Tonight Show')
~*~
Throat
Victrola spins a threnody of writhing silk bolts;
billows blue damask from outsized spools. Trapped wing-beats,
tourmaline eye-beads, red netting on vintage millinery.
Soft bodies flutter and bleat behind epiglottis. An urgent entreaty
and the chanteuse opens her throat to release -- Calliope,
Magnificent, Violet-Crowned, Lucifer. The feather tracts,
the pearl gray tips, the exotic decurving. Oh magenta gorget.
Black gorget with purple throat band.
White gorget with purple rays that may be erected.
I call this song Zelda Babycakes. Stiff swirls of frosting
instill an ache in sensitive teeth. Sugared plumules drifting.
I call this song Waverly Featherlashes. How could I resist
those exquisite eyes, those sultry sighs, that diaphanous warbling.
Captivated beak peaks through scarlet veil. Pinnaed neck undulates
until it is transfixed in the piercingly sweet envoi's clasp:
ornamental hat pin through the throat of a hummingbird.
~*~
Multiple Serial Lycanthropy
for Annette
When she was a wolf, she choked on starling bones,
then opened her throat to release an aria
of fully intact birds with indigo wings.
When she was a bird, she flirted with weeping cherry trees
until pink hair bloomed and cascaded posy
into lonely puddles. Tiny fish kissed bubbles
to the breaking point, released the small prisms
glowing inside. The minnow scales brightened
into hallelujah syllables of rainbow trout.
When she was a girl, she caught and released
so many orphaned creepy crawlies. Skinned knees
were strange jewels in her queendom
where crickets perched between naked toes
hummed like itty bitty violins as she sang ditties--
O art and love and vibrant, trembling blades
of grass bedecked with blue impatiens.
O how the ripe pods burst open when touched.
O how the cornflower bruises spread across her chest.
When she was a woman, she ripped open her corset;
bared her moon-white breasts to the wild teeth
that ate their way into the night and frolicked wherever they pleased.
~*~