Barry BLUMENFELD
Haircut
Lush Tucson! Black widows
Colonizing my back porch,
Great green un-nameable
Wings of some thing flutter-
Ing on the porch screen—the
Spooks keep a-coming.
Like this flying bug,
Slammed me in the back
Right on the spine one
Day, shooting waves of
Cancer-kundalini
Up to my third eye: a
Stupendous roach. I was
A Bronx boy; cockroaches
Are my cousins. Midnights
On Mosholu Parkway,
I flicked the light-switch,
They froze, then scrammed by the
Dozen. Swallowed them in
Chocolate milk, bit them
In two and spat them out
Between my teeth. Bronx roaches.
But this Speedway beast could
Eat a baby's arm. In my
Kitchen, squatting, staring,
Waving those antennas, it
Made the whole world sick.
So: bugacide with a broom
And a can of Raid. Drenched
Behind the toilet bowl,
After that chase, it looked
Noble. I cleaned up and
Cut my hair. I hacked it
With scissors, I hacked it
With spoons. I chopped it with
Teacups, assassins, and looms.
Then trouble: wife came home.
My queer shoulder hit the door:
She sees me, I see double!
"Getting a haircut," sez I,
And sneaks out the back,
And don't answer when she
Calls, "It's Sunday!"
But it was Sunday. I
Found a barber, at last,
In Tucson's light-washed
Ghetto. Who said, "One thing
I can do." Sage persons
From the neighborhood
Hushed while this surgeon
Shaved my head.
I cackled all the way home.
Wife laughed too. Had to—
She rubadubbed my conk and
I rubbed it and we took
Some pix, and so on, and
So on. That night ash
From the summer fires
And dust from the desert
Drove us out by car to the east,
Where the Santa Catalinas
Blazed sideways in the dark.
Best not to speak of fear
And shame: we were nearly
Lovers.
In Detention
The death-cries of the monsters
Are titanic and melodious
Rolling over Brooklyn.
Gloating crowds fringe the Bay.
Day and night the radio pleads, stay home.
Regal, furious, the last creatures
Founder in shallow water.
T. E. Lawrence is in Brooklyn.
He has deceived the world again.
His deathbed nurse is pleasing,
With clear eyes and fine skin.
She takes his pants down and clasps
His withered cock between her lips.
Ode to Prince
Sleep doesn't come—
You, your white guitar as answer to the ulu knife
The round rock woman with bone tear eyes
I see before me wears, haunt me,
Your mascara'd lights
Burning a prayer it will take my life
To intuit on my tongue.
Bums burning on the sidewalks of Saint Paul
Forget what they need to
To recall the Inuit face I saw one tracing
In the dust today,
Over and over circling his thumb to make her stare,
The same one, looking straight up for comfort
Into a gaze as crazy as its own.
Yours is simpler to bear.
Sex and violins tune your ivory axe
To a pitch of indecision, sweet rex,
And I lie here listening to the wind blow black doves
Off their perches as it freshens.
If it's alive, it's helpless
In a storm like yours. You raven,
You embryo assassin,
I crave your silver memories, endless
Songs of your white guitar
Ululating endlessly, no end
To the storm's mandala.
Daggers, daggers—
You've pitted a truth against an untruth.
Something silent sings along with you,
A phantom in the band.
It idly drills a line of little pits
In the Inoucdjouac woman's stone skin
While stray amperes convulse you,
Insouciant, sitting lotus,
Leaning on a drum.
I'll take every little thing I need from you.
Ecstasies of unrequited love,
Hexes, sarcastic harmonies,
Tanks of your syrupy rage.
My advice: remember your materials.
Stone. Ivory. Bone.
Burn your father's manuscripts.