On the prairie

Aloft crested peaks that gently slope into her crossed legs, a bespectacled Grant Wood impersonating Oliver Wendell Douglas catcalls at Zsa Zsa Gabor pitching hay in the buff.

Say hello to city living as he drags her away from the lie of the land, full of rolling plains mainly dry of rain but green still. For across the lost horizon lined with ripened fruit stands erect their lone ribbed condominium perpendicular the junction where petticoats hang as if Kilroy was already there.

Time to harvest the seedlings planted late winter, she objects but the Hawkeye in him is too impatient, already late for his appointment with the family orthodontist waiting by an old easel, eager to paint. Yet even in a hurry, he does stop, though, just long enough to pose from her point of view and crops the depth of field provincially.

Now the fallow ground swells, an expanse isometrically compressing dormant plate tectonics to bubble up succubi transforming her pink fleshy body into verdant countryside.

So over the hill both eschew the flaneur promising drink and take turns to cultivate their own gardens at the pitched fork in the road.

Virgins

Together,

photographically seamed
without a stitch
a long distance copy

Adam and Eve
sans apple, only serpents

but in the basement
or bedroom
rather than garden

exposing
John and Yoko
to reveal digitized
pillow talk
between white sheets
of elevator music

an album recording
their naked passion

even if imagined
through pictures
in lieu of

making love.

Steerage

Lying back relaxed,
her brown pupils
ever so Cindy Sherman
gaze off,

a worm's eye view
in black and white.

Through the glass
tapered shadows 
architecturally proportionate
disguise traditional ground
from silhouetted figure

Ellsworth Kelly, of course, 
disapproves. But who cares? 
Certainly not our displaced heroine 
modeling nude for Alfred Stieglitz

early on in the twentieth century
when the industrial revolution built 
cities of steel to capture their souls 
until the desert sands beckoned

the prodigal daughter returns
from Broadway, 

boogie woogie 
be damned 

as abandoned skyscrapers afloat 
in negative space, a succession 
of white clouds marching in unison
bloom into petaled cow skulls.

Black nights cooled down 
before their journey west 
holding hands 
with another monkey king 

and true to form he now sheds his clothes

in intense heat.

Inamorata

Under the red light she waves unhurriedly, demure of any gesticulation before languishing sideways onto the reddened divan. An innocent act, for sure, meant to comport vulnerability akin to something kawaii but the lonely dragster revving his engine at the intersection, refuses to peel off.

Or maybe not, for how often does an unclothed Olympia gaze upon you from her seraglio? he wonders and mesmerized, lifts his reflective visor to leer at her ecdysial state in spite of himself, unblinking until both eyelids grow cumbrous from the torpid discourse about to lecture...

Then without any provocation, a preternatural quiet sucks all the white noise through a clear straw, cleansing old wounds. In that void, words form but do not speak. Octagonal translation universally
transmits a failure to communicate in either Japanese or Swedish. Perhaps the remedy then is telepathic or semaphoric or even photographic.

He strips completely down to increase his magnetic field, but to no avail as she fades further into black.

Minutes go by before the man, now her lover, regains his equilibrium enough to snag her from the vacuum and lock lips in resuscitation.

She awakens in his arms. Her entree, recently plated, sits on the silver tray room service delivered almost an hour earlier.

Somewhere near Alburquerque

Conjoined mounds, a doppelgänger of its displaced mistress, sits upon the land enchanted, cooing.

So who does she mean to woo remains lost in geodesic thought about how love is metaphysical gravity and naturally wanders right past the white picket fence gate at first before retracing his steps, straining to listen. Her voice, though a thousand miles away, can be heard through the thick purple sky from the setting sun, amplified by the trapezoidal plates overlapping sheet metal salvaged from the abandoned Volvo ready for scrap, some sections barely duck taped, which form the outer shell as roof.

No bunny ranch here, just a woebegone Dymaxion house, the angel on his shoulder whispers, distracted by what R. Buckminster Fuller mistook as tetrahedrons behind the twisted chicken wire armature propping the aluminum foiled coat hanger bent into antennae.

Yet something about the atrophic structure beckons and eventually instinct does force him to stop hunting long enough to knock on the prefabbed door. A hoarse welcome shouts to come in which he begrudgingly abides. But why invite such a ghost? Let bygones be bygones, they say, but she takes comfort knowing her place is not haunted by infected genetic material.

But bad blood will often more than not still coagulate so the dark interior requires his eyes several minutes to adjust in order to repay an old debt saving big money and slowly dilated pupils overstimulate.

For the portal he passed through, a spade-shaped window frame of sprawling vines now becomes another dimension which belies the external state of disrepair in classic forensics, compliments of the stepbrother who would be handyman squatting in residence, ready to argue the Fibonacci sequence in defense.

March follows the long February of Iroquois snow. So where did she go? When will the lady of the house return?

Soon the water will flow again.

Rectangular notes

The lesson of a rectangle is harsh. Geometrically speaking, its sharpness, though crisp, reveals truth. So to alleviate the pain, add fringes to both ends.

Any imagined hierarchy still hurts to swallow, though.

Rendezvous

Up north
down the block

martinis
neatly shaken
with lychee,
jalapeño
and soju

to order

fresh saudade
sautéed
atop scallioned
omelet

no yukhoe
tonight

maybe
too raw

waiting on
Helen and Mark
later than sooner

on the half shell
bluepoints, malpeques,
kumamotos

around the corner
from Maatsumoto
deaf father and son

look for

white Doric columns
red hand-railing
three-story grey stone

the house
on Foster

is empty

no one home
except us

flipping
plastic-covered
ring-bound

colorless
family tree
deep rooted

our sanctuary
lies sixty degrees
Fahrenheit
cooler

body heat
furnace blow
whispered coos

tongue earlobe
follow neck contour
adagio

areola
then circle
nipple

as you
engulf

Upstairs, downstairs

Cloistered

in her bedroom
on the second floor,
Grandmother
now ninety-six years old

watches
WGN-TV News
in the dark
to save electricity

while
in the apartment
below

the thin
Disney themed quilt
barely blankets
their nakedness

as he ensconces
her warm body
from behind,

cuddling
arms, legs

skin

Posing

Faceless,
nude

lithe and tawny
Neruda said

shame
she is

jigsawed,

detached legs
sometimes arms
growing many newer
prismatic limbs,

either glorified hosiery
collaged
as repurposed Barbie

or even Kali

transporting
piggybacked head shots
parading across pages

or montaged torso

her lower body
arched and kneeling
waist down morphed
four ways

mutated Doctor Dolittle species

silver haunches
like a rotating bowl of pears
Esther Williams dives into
bird's eye view

with a huge splash

a lovely Busby Berkeley musical
production

back then

once her lone muse
now mine

from pictures to words

now reassembled
beautifully whole

figure to behold

forever
in fine print.

Going home

Last night a breath shared
and lips partially parted
warming the cockles

as the music lulled past midnight
in a castle nearly forgotten,

caught off guard
those early to bed

A dangerous liaison?
Who expected
Not I

You belonged to an ideal,

a romanticism
huddled beneath
the forlorn disco ball,
tequila, and lukewarm
cans of Squirt

No wonder saints
deigned to rendezvous
anew resuscitated
architecture

where barrel vaulted windows
frame clove and mistletoe
inhaled together,
algid

Horace Greeley beckons
heed his prophecy

It awaits,
your hibernaculum

But no matter how faraway
I will come

A short affair

Out of sight
so quickly

Some other time
soon for sure

lying in wait

No picture
in anticipation
to appease
the absence-

No, wait-

the emptiness
close up
so far
and few between

Unhappy
about who
you are
too beautiful

Adorned
naked to the eye
on glossy paper

Let me see

Notes on track

Discrete forms doodled on the margins in convoluted geometry oddly become interlaced overlapping pop cultural tessellations. Not quite fooling the eye but visually comforting in its lazier simplifications which function then to duplicate childhood Hot Wheels plastic tongue-and-groove track that in thirty inch length strips made for utile makeshift pirate scarabs.

The frontality of the overhead view recalls the scale shift expected when telescoping to a larger picture plane and what was orange is now gray, calligraphic in its linearity that harkens Franz Kline except predictably finite and closed rather than openly composed begging something structurally flat rather than patterned image.

Yet so many combinations from a limited supply of prefabricated materials to affect design options so that a lone figure eight lays down ad infinitum.

DAMN BBQ! You Scary!

(from howispentmyperdiem.com)

In the country of Texas as is required, the two Jasons and his Lar embark upon our mission from God in search of barbequed swine… because not doing so would automatically revoke our American citizenship which applies even for a resident Canuck like Dunda. Luckily and per the father of Pun Intended alumna Ali Landers, said three amigos via Skobbler arrived in the parking lot just inside downtown Houston at Luling City Market in anticipation, in hunger, and suffice to say, in love.

Like the many convicts incarcerated in the Lone Star State awaiting their conjugal visit, it was truly love at first sight soon to be consummated. And why not as the picture (bride) below of our sauced and saucy dreams prove.

Outside this dude ranch straight out of City Slickers (or at least, a suburbanized version of Giant with Jimmy the Dean and Rock the Hudson), the waft of smoked meatage in the hot eighty degree air bitch‐slapped us like a leopard chasing down a marmoset and ripping into its flesh making you say, “If that thing came by my house, I’d kill it!” kind of good.

Inside among the good ole boys and preppy business folk out to satiate their meatlust is, quite simply put, hog (and beef brisket and chicken) heaven behind a greasy windowed lunch counter. Glorious slabs, pulchritudinous chunks, glistening carcasses lay out luxuriously as if a “rat‐lookin’ thing all ate up”. We queue while espying the menu above our plastic‐shower‐capped‐under‐a‐baseball‐cap hosts selling the individual animal flesh strictly by the pound and agree on family style for maximum sampling. Dunda goes first and orders a pound of brisket which he supplements with a mini pecan pie for dessert. I follow with a whole succulent chicken. Jozwiak at first asks for a pound of ribs but when the server cuts off only five individual bones quickly doubles the amount.

Then finally we sat us down with our sweet iced tea and selected side of cole slaw on an indoor picnic table to properly apportion and chow down. Each of us divvied up our paper plate with three fall‐off‐the‐bone ribs, three slices or so of brisket and preferred section of white or dark meat bird slathered in a tangy orangy sauce so finger‐licking good that Jozwiak committed the rookie error of buying a bottle of— forgetting the 3‐1‐1 travel liquid rule.

That first collective bite sounded obscene, if not outright pornographic with the three of us cooing, moaning and groaning in orgiastic harmony. Every bite after, the same salacious tune. As Hawk Harrelson would have said, “MMMMMMMmmmmm, boy! Good eating! Some just as good, none better.” Or imagine Snuffles the Dog from the Quick Draw McGraw cartoon pointing to his mouth for a snack going “AH, ah, ah, ah, ah!”. And he would wolf it down and fly into the air going "MMMMM!, MMMMM!!, MMMMMMM!!!” while holding his fat tummy and then float down like a feather going “AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!” 

That described the three of us exactly.

Serving man

Bookend sentinel,
lost in space

you come hither
but in peace
offering soylent green

blue faced, rose-colored

spectacles wearing white

polyester bell bottoms stretched 

over long greenly laced legs

of interwoven veined spirographs, 

supernovae radiantly out-of-control

to eat me alive.

So an aperitif first,
ultramarine liquid, blurring faculty, 

cleansing palate, warping 

space/time continuum

before pursed lips blow a naked kiss 

concussive enough 

obliterating skin-tight spacesuit to 

bare skin

And for the main entree,

nawa shibari

arms bound, legs tied, mouth 

gagged, whole body 

suspended in anime

floating zero gravity

no one can hear you scream 

for ecstasy deafens
swirling into time tunnels, 

completely harnessed

And still I succumb.

Of the birds and the bees

Gravy spills while the beans on the grill begin to burn.

"Surely you joust," retorted the not-so-famous thirteenth century Greek philosopher when pressed for his secret ingredients during the ad hoc bra mitzvah under the Manhattan Bridge.

Yet wearing a codpiece outside your pants is so medieval, all in attendance concur. So why did the plastic chicken cross the country road? Any average-sized thumb could answer that simple riddle.

The bartender nods and points at the helicopter below the belt, rotor blades out of synch coughing. But an uninvited Tracy Emin already beats him to the sucker punch, unequal parts banana and two ripe melons with a dash of bitters on their rocks.

Just say no, just say no, both implore in stereo as the mixed-up conversation suddenly melts, causing him to suddenly sweat.

Who can tell for sure whether the bastard is suffering from total yellow fever though his wife did text for emergency evacuation.

The octopus in the room decides right then to rise and head to the bathroom. Coming to grips with tentacles is often much sexier than any fetish.

LHOOQ goes the pun.

(Another) Cut

Daddy, the amateur knife thrower, needs a new pair of shoes

and so blindfolded, rears back his left arm, taking aim at her stripped body rotating crazily between seven to eight revolutions per minute on the life-sized roulette wheel in concert for the contestant playing along at home on the phone.

Their prize if he pins the tail on the proverbial donkey on his first try will be that all time goes backwards wiping out everything she fought for until then, a desperate measure for a lost cause.

Behind him, a cloaked archer curiously in a judo outfit but holding a bow with arrow nevertheless and an eye-patched urban cowboy awkwardly twirling his vintage six-shooters exchange strategic notes, awaiting their turn.

Squinting under the lone spotlight shone directly on cue, she blinks a secret message that the teleprompter pauses and rewinds in slow motion.

It must be folly, probably of youth, to face her accusers so what was she thinking? And how did things get so out of hand?

No one, least of all her, now cares.

To agree so compliantly feels like surrender but what of promises made that now appear only to be bad hindsight.

Luck sometimes be a whore later.

Fashion by design

In the waning hours of haute couture, an empty nest cantilevered above a stony lintel begs for amnesty when she retreats, red-breasted just after night falls.

Shadows pretending to be silhouettes haggle market price in antebellum terms, but all for naught as no sale, not even for the trunkful passing by Joseph Cornell jettisoned and preserved through the looking-glass.

Barefoot, our contessa lays away the straight-laced boots on display, and her long polished fingernails without thinking reposes her floppy Napoleonic bonnet at a jauntier tilt so that the upswept brim, though black, smiles back widely, a harbinger of summertime.

Late June but her gait, ever so relaxed, stirs hope eternal. For Audrey Hepburn is jealous and the neighborhood hipsters lounge about the full blue moon. Robins are rich and their daddies often love sugared iced tea. Now hush, little shopkeeper, no need to bawl. Only a few more weeks before his flight back home.

So thank heavens that the bus stop headed home is only across the noisier-than-usual street, down a long city block.

Nevertheless the price to pay can be too vogue.

Redemption out of nowhere

It gnawed through the inner casing like strawberry flavored Twizzlers, exposing raw, hot wire.

Instinct said to let it go as nothing good ever comes from live electricity except an obvious painful jolt. So homilies aside, imagine the shock or lack thereof when the expected fireworks never materialized. Save for a last minute reminder as a courtesy out of curiosity or maybe in spite really to recoup a lost vestige of dignity did another chance resuscitate previously dashed hopes, a primaveral spud ready to spout.

Who could predict such a change of heart then to befall the sanctioned pomp and circumstance, to be cut off without reprieve, a persona non grata of your own free will.

"Silly rabbit, pink is for kids! 

Or at least dumb chinchillas clueless about how to color me beautiful...," yelled the giant leprechaun into the realm of the senses before disrobing to eat his annual bowl of sugary cereal. 

His warning went unheeded, though as a barely audible peep momentarily broke the imposed radio silence, forcing time to move on possibly. But fools do dive in headfirst.

And again, once... twice... three times the sucker, a hard-candied outer shell easily and irresistibly crunched to reach the fractured soft caramel core. Thus the mortar-boarded and bespectacled owl who actually gave a hoot said to no one in particular.

Why not just continue to let the saliva melt down the reactor because even Joe Q. Public knows shopping cures all.

Notes from booze and bacon

A bad see-through pun loops while suspended in the corner on a black arm adjacent a few onlookers slowly peering at the commotion two so-called chefs pretend to stir up. No one can really hear what both are jabbering about since the porcine tributes hung in salon style on surrounding walls deflect and scatter their empty banter before it could gain any momentum.

Yesterday permitted to roam freely about, opens the front door to escape the hot air which ironically blasts in past the guarded porthole on a three-hour tour to rescue the seven passengers stranded on the kitchen isle. As usual, Elijah Craig is standing blindly by his former professor serving a homemade dandelion concoction the younger Gilligan winces at in distaste, proclaiming how "I hate huckleberries" though, four out of our beloved five millionaires believed contrary.

The only thing missing now, it seems, is pink sauce.

So to sweeten the boiling but not melting pot, our gracious host summons his ninja princess who descends commando, forsaking all modesty for a lighter airiness from the blueless clouds, an Amazonian decision apparently premeditated toward disenthrallment rather than fashion. The gauzy tunic she wears then billows like a seven year itch, an accidental parachute slowing her down enough to stick the three-point crash landing atop a broken concrete slab.

Those outside where cooler bodies prevail feel a glow beginning to glimmer from underneath her loosely fit robe, growing warmer then suddenly hot enough to spontaneously combust the thin fabric. She now stands nude but softly mouths a secret incantation that stirs an invisible fluttering enough to stiffen the crowd. Even so, it is hard for them not to stare lustfully.

Her tightly bound top knot becomes edited later, lost history scrubbed from public record.

Last Days of Pompeii

Another long day's journey into the night and the Northwest Dallas Forty Express, usually a long-winding, nonstop caravan, sat still, hemmed in by inchoate rush hour en route home from the cement pond while the traffic of her dizzying conversation sped along at one hundred twenty miles an hour, too fast for any highway patrol radar gun to clock, pull over and appropriately ticket.

Along the way, the weak chose seppuku rather than endure such protracted torture but not him, not our stone-faced Roman, for centurions never ever give in that easily.

Eyes forward behind mirrored sunglasses as his wont, Del Piombo's descendent seven times removed was trapped as well, himself engaged in a stereophonic debate with Ennio Morricone about which glittery fedora one ought to wear when in the company of cornhuskers as she rattled forth.

Kao Sifu should beat all of them there but not if he could help it, they knew, exhorting his lookalike below deck for full steam ahead.

Besides according to his brand new shiny watch, a bejeweled sundial of a family heirloom from his buddies Martini and Rossi, all signs pointed toward little Britain where grilled marsupial stuffed with roasted kangaroo testicles and crushed garlic awaited as apt reward for listening to her verbally demonstrate endless quick moves in combination to solve consecutive Rubrik's Cubes conjured in mid-air.

Nothing save an eight year old Hapkido white belt breaking his toe or a fever of stingrays or getting thrown under the Greyhound could break his concentration. Then faster than a rerun of Cannonball Run II, our mecca the Anatole appeared on the golden horizon. 

Later at the gossip bar, all found it hard to believe that just the week before, the three would-be amigos stood under a huge sign advertising a Gentlemen's Club with membership cards proudly displayed and actually passed the time discussing the finer points of toilet etiquette.

"Make sure to sit down when you take a piss..." 

Such was inscribed, lest we forgot, in the ladie's room above the urinal.