Oedipus Tyrannus

Not all closets contain queens.
Sometimes skeletons break out,
sometimes Danaidae monarchs.
My wardrobe doesn't have a mirror.
Reflections interest only fairies,
their need for pancake make-up
to matte sad tales of loss.

I've never been the weaker sex-
my mother made certain of that.
She called me her little prince before
banishing me to class. I walked home
whenever I could, hitched rides
with men who thought sweets
could peel away my schoolgirl pants.
 
My mother is no queen, just a bitch
I caught offering treats in our bed
when I arrived three hours early.
Father had no right to lap up
breakfast marmalade between her legs.
I threw him out with his own revolver.
This is my territory.

For years she wept in my arms
while I held the muzzle against her ribs
until she signed for divorce.
I am her King . Every evening I call
Jocasta. She bows, undresses me
towards the wrought iron where
she suckles my breast and I moan.

The Missed Curve

The secret behind a polaroid smile
is knowing how to turn the perfect curve,
like driving 200 miles per hour to cut corners.

That's something short of suicide, you chuckled,
twisting the frayed ends of a schoolgirl skirt,
your knuckles run insistent spools.

Of course, you have a point there.

With all these shutter-clicking eyes taking every move
ready to pounce and tear us into morsels of gossip,
or maybe spread-eagle us with fear or Freud.
Worst, offer us sweet misunderstanding.

It is something like suicide out there,
this merciless stifling of tears and sudden sorrow,
this biting down hard to reveal well-checked teeth -
and braking just for that perfect curve of lips.

You turn to me, eyes like headlights, to model
your polaroid smile. Both of us mourn
dear old dad, buried in smoke-metal ravine
for having missed the corner and swerved too late.





previously published in The Rearview Quarterly (Winter 2002, Vol 1, Issue 3)

Rediscovering Paris Through Female Body Parts

You invite her to your room for a nightcap,
read every winding street on her palm.
The disclosure is intimate like her lips
on your neck. In the half-light, she strips.

Her arms are lined with cafés, the awnings
decorative bracelets. Flea markets bustle
at her feet, dusty with pickpockets.
Her toenails excite you; everything is cheap.

She settles in bed. The river Seine flows
through her legs, your hand wanders
upwards like a cutter with broken mast,
anchors near her tufted port of entry.

Champs-Elysées spreads around her navel,
fluctuates with the lighting of the lamps.
The shops promise high prices to pay;
the traffic heavy as your breathing.

Her breasts quiver with Louvre pyramids.
Mona Lisa hides in the microscopic scars
around her nipples. Underskin, you realize
there's been fraud with silicon.

Notre Dame is in her mind. You enter
through her eyes, remove your baseball cap.
The cathedral is empty but for tourists
and dark save for camera flashes.

You ask if she is comfortable being split
into parts. She smiles languidly under
the influence of wine and narcotics.
The chainsaw is plugged; she dozes off.