Jenene Ravesloot

Rain at Midnight, a Sestina | Poem by Jenene Ravesloot

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Rain at Midnight

A midnight rain, more rain, someone moving down the street,
someone whistling Carmen’s “Habanera,” whistling it off-key
as rain, more rain falls on a half raised windowpane.
Puddles shimmer like butterflies behind the torn screen.
Everything is neon in this light, everything gleams.
I have to kill him while I have the chance.

I have to kill him. I have the chance.
Rain, rain, more rain falls on the oil slick street;
everything is neon in this light. Everything gleams
while he whistles the “Habanera,” whistles it off-key.
Puddles shimmer like butterflies behind the torn screen.
Rain, more rain falls on a half raised windowpane.

Rain falls on a half raised windowpane.
I have to kill him. I still have the chance.
I see him, see that fluttering behind the screen,
see rain on the windowpane; lights blinking on the street.
He whistles Carmen’s “Habanera,” whistles it off-key.
Everything is neon in this light. The gun gleams.

Everything is neon in this light. The gun barrel gleams.
I listen to that whistling at the half raised windowpane,
him whistling the “Habanera.” He whistles it off-key.
I have to kill him. This is my chance.
A midnight rain, more rain, footsteps on the street;
puddles shimmer like butterflies behind the torn screen.

Puddles shimmer behind the torn window screen,
walls flash in this neon light. The gun barrel gleams.
His heavy footsteps move down the street as rain,
more rain falls on the smeared windowpane.
I have to kill him. I know I still have the chance
while he whistles Carmen’s “Habanera,” whistles it off-key.

He whistles the “Habanera,” whistles it off-key.
Puddles shimmer behind the torn screen.
I should kill him while I have the chance,
should kill him while everything sits in neon, gleams.
Rain, rain, rain falls on the raised windowpane;
falls on his footsteps as he moves down the street.

A raised windowpane—I can kill him. This is my chance
as he moves down the street. Everything is neon. The gun gleams.
He whistles off-key. Puddles flutter behind the torn screen.

Jenene Ravesloot

A Sestina

Crime Blotter Poems | The Chef’s Confession | Sliders by Jenene Ravesloot

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Chef Crime Scene poem

Crime Blotter #8-The Chef’s Confession

Salt-baked leg of lamb cooking in the oven.

Nesting in cut glass salad bowls: ¼ cup of

finely chopped fennel fronds along with one

bunch of sliced pink radishes, two cucumbers

finely diced and massaged in sea salt, lemon

juice, Lunigiana olive oil.

Dinner won’t be ready for another half-hour.

I like to linger in the kitchen, savor a glass

of Sauvignon Blanc. That’s when I do my best

thinking, just before I sit down with mother.

I hear the laughter of the kids next door.

They are in their backyard and they’re

horsing around in the inflatable swimming

pool, the kind of pool you can buy anywhere.

Mother walks into the kitchen. She’s saying,

“This damn heat” and that really annoys me.

She’s always complaining about something

and I say so, which doesn’t make matters

any better. Before long we are yelling at

each other. I guess I get sort of carried away.

It’s not that I don’t love her. I’ve always loved

her, and I am a good son. But, it is like loving

a damaged dog, loving it in spite of bad breath

and bad habits.

Put up with it, that’s what I do. Put up with her.

I mean I am a good son. I do everything. I tell

her that too. She takes a swing at me, and I take

a swing at her. She doesn’t flinch. No excuses.

I do it. I’ve had enough. Afterwards I eat some

of the pink radishes right out of the bowl with

my fingers. Then I call the police.

 

 

 

 

 

 Crime Blotter#4-Sliders      

The female mark is telling me “I guess I was too distracted,
this being the Fourth. You know, all the noise, and the fact  
that I’m in a hurry, and on my cell describing the fireworks
I just saw at the Pier to my girlfriend. Anyway, I pull into
the gas station, talking all the time. I begin to fill ‘er up.
A car slips in next to mine. Needless to say, I’m not paying
much attention. However, I do notice two guys, and I’m
supposing they’re about to fill ‘er up too, just like me.
Apparently not! Who would guess one of them would slide
across and open the passenger door just enough to get my
purse. Sneaky! He must have practically crawled on his hands
and knees while I was pumping and talking. But, like I said,
I didn’t notice a thing until I got back into my car. My purse
is gone, and I’m thinking, Where is it? Am I crazy or what?
Then it hits me. I’ve been robbed. So I say to my girlfriend,
one of the guys in the next car must have swiped my purse
before they drove away. That’s when she tells me that in
Atlanta the cops call these guys, sliders. She should know.
She’s from there. Sliders! Don’t you love it?”

Jenene Ravesloot

 

After Life | Life Lines | Crime Scene | Pantoum 911 by Jenene Ravesloot

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after-life-life-lines-crime-scene-pantoum-911-by-jenene-ravesloot-2

 

After Life

Four red circles on the wall-to-wall
carpet in the master bedroom where
a bureau used to be; a fake ficus
along the chair rail in the hallway;
peeling wallpaper, peeling paint,
damaged doors, more doors that
lead to other rooms. When they
are turned, glass doorknobs skin
knuckles against the frame.

A threadbare stair runner leads
down to an empty hallway and
an empty living room except for
the dead possum that lies in the
fireplace with a damaged doll.

An open front door creaks on its
hinges like a porch swing while
the usual birds sing in the usual
fading light.


First Published in Skylines,
The Poets’ Club of Chicago,
78th Anniversary Anthology, 2014

 

Life Lines

Orphanages, foster homes,
parochial schools, marriage,
separation, divorce;
nights on someone else’s
couch; dank rooms rented by
the week in Philly, L.A.,
Miami, and Chicago;
corned beef hash hangouts
tiled subway-white;4 a.m.
bars, sawdust-covered floors,
boilermakers, burgers;
Figaro’s saloon on Oak Street;
jazz until 6 a.m.; indifferent lovers
whose names you can’t recall;
walks alone in the park at noon;
horns, whistles, harbor bells
that used to comfort; the sounds
of rats’ claws behind a bedroom
wall.

 
after-life-life-lines-crime-scene-pantoum-911-by-jenene-ravesloot
Crime Scene

Blue morning glories sagging in the rain;
sound of blue rain in blue alley shadows—
the click, click, click of metal against metal,
then, bang, bang, bang.

Three bullets for sure, maybe more somewhere,
no witnesses except perhaps this mewing cat
with matted blood-spattered fur or that smooth
bronze face peeking through the iron bars
of a basement window.


First published in the Chronicles of Scarbo, Second Edition,
2012, 2013. Also published in The Poetry Storehouse, 2014
as an audio file in 2014. Later in 2014, “Crime Scene” was
made into a video poem by Paul Broderick/The Poetry
Storehouse.

 

Pantoum 911

The neighbor’s parrot screams There’s been a crime.
The white oncidiums burn in their pots; they’ve been hexed,
but it’s here on the bed you’ll lie.
You toss and cannot rest.

The white oncidiums burn in their pots; they’ve been hexed.
The tides push in and out like a spoon.
You toss and cannot rest,
begin to hum a childhood tune.

The tides push in and out like a spoon.
Seagulls circle evening’s fading light.
You begin to hum a childhood tune.
Clouds cut the sky. A half-moon takes flight.

Seagulls circle evening’s fading light,
but it’s here on the bed you’ll lie.
Clouds cut the sky. A half-moon takes flight.
The neighbor’s parrot screams There’s been a crime.

Jenene Ravesloot

First published in Loot: Stolen Memories & Tales Out of School,
2008. Later published as a song for the CD White Narcissus, 2009

 

                                                Jenene Ravesloot Bio

 Jenene Ravesloot is a member of The Poets’ Club of Chicago, the Illinois State Poetry Society, Poets & Patrons, and the TallGrass Writers Guild.

She has written three books of Poetry:

Loot: Stolen Memories & Tales Out of School,  The Chronicles of Scarbo, and Floating Worlds.

Jenene has published in The Poetry Storehouse, Connotation Press: An Online Artifact, Packingtown Review, The Miscreant, After Hours Press, Exact Change Only, Sam Smith’s The Journal in the UK, THIS Literary Magazine, and other online journals, print journals, and anthologies.