LatinosUSA

A Crow Swoops

with fingertip wings, bouncing
once on the
grass, then taking off–
little legs like landing
gear–to the roof of the
Post Office, gray granite
block rock solid in Grant-
style–the General buried
in the basement beside
his cross-eyed wife, Julia, while
Fish & Ward, Grant’s swindlers,
installed on an upper floor,
condemned to lick stamps
onto eternity.

~~

?

a lonely dither
a vodka haze
a blackbird lipse
a conifer tune
black-eyed jeans
cranberry style
rainiacs of gloom
crotchless memories
see-through dreams

~~

Carrie Meeber

Like the stride of a go-getter
on the streets of bold
like the satin sheet beneath
Cleopatra’s derriere
like rough on brick
like stink on shit
like the road to Heaven
or Mandalay
like a cigarette in the drummer Drouet’s
mealy mouth
like Sister Carrie’s breasts
in Hurstwood’s dirty grip
like the sun over Egypt
in the reign of Tut
like a crape creeping through the
pages of a Patty Highsmith
novel.

~~

Art?

pigeon-splatter like an
abstract painting
on the sidewalk
under the tree
in front the
Chinese restaurant:
not Pollock, more
Mark Tobey interlaced skeins
of white muck, a
Jasper John’s gray
background of
cigarette butts, twigs
that give an art-brut
Jean Dubuffet
je ne sais quoi.

~~

Van Gogh

cut off his ear
to spite his face;
cut off his ear because
he had nothing else
to give his girl
on Valentine’s Day;
cut his ear because
was sick of listening to
Gauguin run his mouth;
cut because
he had nothing better to do
on a Saturday night.