|
The tulip girl loves her tulip world
of satin pink clouds
and talking squirrels.
Absent the shame
of bloodied sheets
and semen-stiff towels
resting on cat-piss carpets.
Absent little girls reddened
by hot hot coffee
poured down baby throats
already swollen with silent screams
because daddy's two-lips only blossom
to bite.
Absent the talking men
who know know know
of hard lust-thrusts
that bruise girl-backs
and rocky fists
that break through walls
and force the bricks into jelly.
Absent the dying gods
who never made it to the moon
but made it with VD women
and hateful bottles
and machine tube needles
that burst legendary veins.
Absent groping poet-boys
in sidestreet-parked cars
who say they want to teach
so they hide the keys
and make her
leave the seat-belt on.
Absent broken-winged angels
weeping into hungry ashtrays filled with
butts that bear the shadows
of worried morning-after lips.
So the tulip girl lives in her tulip world
of satin pink clouds
and talking squirrels
and tries not to scream as the rot sets in
and tries to set jewels into gaping arm-sores
and makes magic golden ropes of skull-dropped hair
and stares at the dead men,
wondering why the tulips won't grow.
She would gaze
secretly,
at the class photo
taken in 1929.
Her later retreat to the bathroom
leaves the shadow
of a young girl
smelling of orchids
and dreaming of clouds,
content in her gilded frame.
While cigarette smoke crept
up the gaudy golden wallpaper
toward the trustworthy fan,
she would search the mirror
with questions in her eyes.
Through the weary flesh
her cheekbones rose proudly
in a denial of gravity and time.
The reek of Chanel No. 5
drifting from her body
danced with smoke
and watered her eyes.
In the shine of wistful tears
she saw again
pampered moon flesh
glowing with life and joy
and a heart
pulsing with swan's blood.
She flushed
her burning ceremony stick
down a pastel toilet
and staunchly joined
her outward life again,
a freshly-polished pearl
burning deep in her stomach.
Paper magic melts
coating tongues
poised to welcome
the moon.
Spilled sacrament
soaks midnite carpets
ground by peeled white shoulders
in pagan rites of ecstasy.
Glistening fawn girls slide
naked
down winter hills,
chewed-cherry nipples
streaking black sky
with liquid traces of red.
Racoons feel the screams
so cling to comfort trees.
Stars retract from the brilliance
of gold and pink bodies
dripping spit and snow.
The boy watches.
Lips caked with thigh-honey
blow a silent solo
to breed with the wind
and make the sainted cry.
Tired mouths grin
around the taste of dirt,
dog tongues, and dying rats,
while dreams of graham cracker-innocence
crumble into maudlin dust.
|