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Poetry - Selections from The White Crow v2, i2 - Osric Publishing
(Originally published March, 1996.)
(More poetry from Lyn Lifshin, Kenneth Leonhardt, Charles Kesler, Andrew Urbanus, Gary Jurechka, Ben Ohmart, B. Chown, C.C. Russell, Pete Lee, Mark Senkus, Paul Weinman, Robert L. Penick, Simon Perchik, Mary Winters, John Grey, Michael Estabrook, and P. L. Grimaldi in the print version of The White Crow, available for $2.00 ppd from Osric Publishing.)
Ancient as Dinosaurs>
A manatee's a rube - so what?
It wouldn't sell its soul
For a couple of fish
Like an AquaShow killer whale.
Vegetarian, anyway.
(Not rubbing anyone's nose in it.)
Advice to a circus seal:
Why not give up cute?
Smart. Willing. Wanting.
A manatee's slow.
Lives to a hundred.
Peaceful. No hind legs:
Not like an alligator
Scrambling on shore,
Scaring some kid to death.
Modest. Migrates a dozen miles.
Not like a flashy tern
Flying non-stop Maine to Peru.
A manatee cruises warmer waters.
Coastal seas.
Not the kind to haunt a loch.
- Mary Winters
It Hurts To Look At The Sun
and scant light hides in the shadows beneath trees
diamonds slice diamonds
flower petals wither to a touch
Your green legs
dappling gently by
are like no broken
glass in an alley
- B. Chown
The Kiss
I planted
on your cheek
took root.
In your eyes
iris bulbs
grew blue.
Your face
swaying on the slender
stem of your neck
blossomed.
Seduced by the sweet
scent in your honey hair,
bees sheathed their stingers
to collect nectar.
Humming, birds
driven to drink
from your pollen-laden mouth,
shed their wings
and nested in the hollows
of your shoulder bones.
- Arthur G. Gottlieb
Burning What Was Left Of You
Even lighting
your cheap cigarette
butts
to remember
your smell.
- C.C. Russell
On the first after drought
day of rain, not only the earth
is wet. I see you redescending:
dragged down by the green scale clutching
hands of alcohol,
biting deep the witches green
glass bottle,
dangling from her toxic tit,
jumping back into your addiction
like a diaper boy into dripping
hugs of mother,
steaming with poisoned promise,
stupid with it's fire,
strung in sunrings like a drying fish
salted, broken, and ready
to be consumed.
Alone this time, you're
not a face to me;
I spit your
stupid hunger and
keep on dancing.
- Leslie Young
Last updated 05.05.2001