David Jackson

WIND

A wind of curls that wore a black pants suit
Raced by to flap the flag and chase
The spinning pigeons off the rooftops.
In the bedrooms, the beds put eyeglasses
On their sheets who gazed through the wallpaper
Over the heads of paper roosters
And the stems and curves of red apples
To take notes on the shape of the wind”s legs.
The photographs atop the piano took out
Sketch books and created one-stroke Japanese paintings.
Each stroke duplicated the wrinkles in the wind”s knees.
The wind blew by and the mirrors changed their images
From the wind”s legs to moonlit trap doors.
***

THE EYES OF THE MOON

All planes were grounded
Because the moon opened one eye.
Walls were built around all cities
So the darkness could be x-rayed
And frisked before being allowed to enter.
It was learned that darkness had only one rib
That was made from the thoughts of the zithers
Plucked by Thamar and Ammnon.
Some said that darkness carried a pot of geraniums
With a pink cricket hiding under the leaves
That sung a song about the shadows
Of ghost crabs crossing long salt flats.
Others disputed the discovery, said it was
Semirande wearing a black pants suit
And carrying a pink parasol to the South Pole.
One frightened man said darkness
Carried two baskets filled
With the ashes of burned carnations.
The people were in panic, fearing
That the moon might open both eyes.

ARRIVAL AT THE CITY OF THE LIVING DEAD

When I first arrived in Tampa,
The city of skulls and bolita balls.
I found everyone was buried,
Only their heads stuck out of cement graves,
So they stuck out their tongues
To rub across lipstick smeared on a beer bottle
Shaped to resemble Helen of Troy’s adolescent lips.
It was a city of warped billiard balls
And homebrew in the back room behind swinging doors
With over-peppered chili sold up front.
It was the city of the short half-pint
And hair tonic with fifty percent alcohol.
The voting booths were surrounded
By barbed wire and sawed-off shotguns.

2) Remembering if I Remember

Diversions drip from dirty lips
slip past chins and dribble
towards assorted nipples.
Pass the salt
shaker, mover, groove-monkey,
lover needs a new baguette.
Bananas float in whipped cream bliss,
dreams amiss, a stick of color
me, a berry-blue.
Dab of napkin, swab of sin,
erotic, toxic-licked your skin
is honey, umber hued,
if I remember.