Summer Rehearsal
People took to us but whispered. We talked to everyone. No anxiety. Free. Clowns in a medieval play, reaching like new blooms in beat summer sun. We feigned opera in leather jackets, drank cranberry cordial from plastic cups. Cross-dressed at happy hour, mocked psychedelic phantoms, landed unscathed from shadows whispering Halloween, rarely made it to the bed when we’d get home. We painted faces, pressed your breasts against canvas, and called it art. Watching pleasure, mouthing pleasure, knowing the play was us, the season was short, running head-on, spontaneously, through leaves of contempt, from eyes that have no autumn.
~
Wouldn’t Weep
Partner-for-life mentioned,
that’s she’s never seen him cry -
how important tears are to mental health.
His father, a magician,
turned an unfinished basement,
into a clubroom with wet bar,
a coal room, into a bath with shower.
A seven-year-old 2nd grader,
home from recess a sweaty mess –
first chance at the stand-up -
back out to dodgeball in the alley.
The sorcerer, home early,
discovers the bar of soap,
inadvertently left on the floor
of the newly painted stall.
In warlock mode, drags him from friends,
beat him with his belt,
admonishing disrespect for tricks,
tears disappear for the rest of years.
~
Red Light
Bad day at Delaware Park. Lost the last race in a photo, and that was the day’s highlight. I tried to outrun a hangover, with the hair of the dog, no photo here, Grey Goose easy winner. I’m stopped at the longest light in Wilmington, chin on fist, hurting. This guy pulls alongside, one hand on the wheel, the other choreographing an adamant conversation with no one, then I realize – the head-set thing.
Bad haircut and a headset. What a contrast we present the afternoon.
Him — impressing those both near and far, with his dialog, his eyes showing an altruistic joy, with being so connected. Mine — bleeding and bored, to the point of letting my mind wander into Headset’s world, and imagining his women, profiling his importance.
He’s never out of touch. On top and in control. He provides that input, and direction that inspires.
Constantly pulling the strings and mapping the strategy of whatever empire afforded him this maroon Dodge Spirit and un-ironed, corporate-logoed knit. The light changed and I hit it, wanting to have a clear lead at the first turn.
~
Piccadilly
A poem, hmmm,
hugging your newly won
green stuffed Kermit
to your pale blue tank top
and playfully tonguing
his black and white button eye.
you take an idea
and you wrap your mind
around it, right?
like they twirled
your pink cotton candy
around the white spindle
from which you now plucked
sweet puffs of metaphor
as the Ferris wheel stopped
at the top.
It’s a little piece of peace
up here,
still a quieter pop,
crack, pop
from the shooting gallery
and an occasional whistle
from Tom Thumb.
we swung the metal love seat
to the calliope of Lovin Spoonful
and Kermit grinned when
the humid August air
thick with caramel and crackerjack
whooshed your denim skirt
further up your thigh,
providing a whole new view
of the carnival below
which now needed only a title
and a great ending.
~
Craig Kirchner has written poetry all his life, is now retired, and thinks of poetry as hobo art. He loves storytelling and the aesthetics of the paper and pen. The beautifully parallel, horizontal, blue lines on white legal, staring left to right, knowing that the ink, when it meets the resistance of the page will feel extroverted, set free, at liberty to jump, the two skinny, vertical red lines to get past the margin. He was nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize, and has a book of poetry, Roomful of Navels. After a writing hiatus he was recently published in Decadent Review.