Widows and Dowagers, Husbands and Bullies:
A Prose Poem in Rhyme
Why widows and dowagers
appear so often in novels
of more than a century past
is no secret, men
with money were older than
their entitled brides;
if you look outside among the
shacks and hovels,
you’d find a different story,
mothers dying when
they went through labour,
daughters had no guides
to what lay in store for
them, brutal husbands, lack
of care and misunderstanding
of their needs,
and if they survived, no
shelter, worked on their back
until their charms exploded:
something almost human that bleeds.
In time, with penicillin and
hygiene, the men felt better
no longer crusted over with
sores and bequeathing syphilis
to offspring, the curse of many
a melodrama,
yet females still bore the
burden and no one would let her
think or act for herself, no
pastoral Phyllis
in an Arcadia without
consequences: they’d damn’er
for promiscuity if she took
care, if not, the scarlet letter
would still be sewn to her
bosom and she’d be sent
to one of those misnamed
homes to bear her bastard,
go into service somewhere
unknown, till bent
over with the weight of shame,
dying haggard.
Thus without poetry, no lyric
song upon her lips,
she bid farewell to the cruel
world, at best a word
of warning etched on a
pauper’s grave; anonymous
she lay there in clay
awaiting the apocalypse,
perhaps avoiding history’s
virtuous sword,
forgotten before the
retribution, mere nothingness.
while he, after languishing
in a filthy asylum ward
emerged to face the twentieth
century, its endless wars
and its economic booms and
busts, heroic bard
and illustrious star, as
illusion and delusion mars
all memories of pointless
lives and wasted dreams,
she undone, he redeemed in
streams
of mustard gas and
radioactive dust,
together mingled for eternity
like iron and rust.
Sardine Festival
Once upon a time in
Teneriffe,
among the Canary Islands,
the people gathered for
carnival.
each with a fish, a sardine
if possible, but any maritime
creature would do.
It is Mardi Gras, so sail a
skiff
or swim out to catch with
your hands
some beasty of the deep and
haul
it up and carry it through
the streets,
then bury it deep in the
earth, its due.
No creature is better
equipped
to swim through channels
underground
right to the throne of Death
himself, mean
as mean can be, to tell him
our home truths,
something fishy here in
paradise:
if not Wednesday the Fat,
then Fried-
Day without sardines, sold in
festive booths.
All our truths are double
dipped
in batter to hide the taste,
in masks
to masquerade as life
renewed, tight-lipped
progenitor of all
superstitions: from flasks
flow Veritas and Vanitas,
Siamese Sisters,
blisters and clysters,
conjointly hipped,
they state their theme but no
one asks
for evidence or proof—
perhaps it’s all a spoof.
THROUGH THE THICK OF IT
For every maelstrom I’ve
lived through,
For every tumult in my wake,
For every windstorm in the
desert
Or mountain flashing through
the welken,
There are other moments to be
thankful for.
Let the brain explode in a
thousand rebels
And the conscience cauterize
the healing flow of blood.
Let the wen and the wart and
carbuncle harden
And the ankles swell and the
shoulders stiffen,
There are always moments to
be thankful for.
If I slid through the sluice
into the quaggy mire
Or bounced off a jetty near
the ocean’s quinsy
Or ruffled the feathers of a
guardian turnkey,
Then no matter the outcome so
long as I thrive.
Thrive in the valley of
shadows,
Thrive on the hilltops of
battle,
Thrive under walls meant to
keep me away,
For long is the longitude
over the planets,
Deep are the crevices under
the sea,
Thick are the shadows that
death casts aside,
Let me be thankful, thrive and be welcome.
