model feminist wrath
Author Archives: georgelstein
twenty-seven
Twenty-seven
whether by chance or by a divine intervention,
when darkness comes and gouges the eyes
and bloodies the nose of a mid-june sun
comfortable clothes are ripped from beautiful savants
replaced by their silk and silvery-foil counterparts
the garden thrives in order and in sun
but thirsts for torment and chaos in equal share
whether culled by means of maps and legends
or the madness of genius informed by fortunate circumstance
wanderers find barriers of barbed wire and electrified walls of sound
but where fixed firmaments are encountered,
barriers that would otherwise serve simply as obstacles
now become points for an elegant departure
when those possessing extrasensory brilliance and insight
a higher form of sense, light, and being
while lesser lights fail to discern the sun through the haze
in the heat and glare of a greater fire
when the first petals of the flower flares
then begins to curl, even while others yet emerge,
foreshadow, the first sniff of decay
some flowers slowly atrophy, still clinging to the ideal of beauty
all the while falling, falling further away
while others simply burst into flame
when darkness comes and gouges the eyes, bloodies the nose
and the thirst for cruelty and torment will not sate
a line here or there, but never time enough for a true wrinkle
if six was nine, the end would be at twenty-seven
deere john / flatlanders
deere john / flatlanders
mid-day sun flows down unrelenting on another town
with some name, on a thin blue ribbon with some nunber. On main street,
green tractors punctuated with perky, yellow highlights,
long steel planes and the fat curves of an O’Keefe metaphor
stretch for the length and breadth of a football field or two
their color derived by means of the the marriage of yellow with her primary suitor
made all the more mysterious by his absence
the heart wants, and so
the mind seeks it
el jefe says“wash over here, then there, and then you’re done”
but what she means is “push the mop as if it’s your destiny realized”
creativity and intelligence, virtues that are only just
a burden in the flatlands when one toils for the king
survival of the fittest is perverted, there’s
the stubborn persistence of the wounded and winged
but it still soothes the soul to get time off the reservation
and spend lunch with the lilly-white farmers
strolling to and from their weary pick-up trucks
“caress the mop like it’s your unrequited love”
corporate would be like, so pleased
the verve and glee of barefoot toddlers distracts as the spine tenses and relaxes
questions about cheese inclusion or exclusion are pondered
this is the moment, this is it, a real choice
illusion, it is nothing but a shared delusion
when will someone spill their own truth
“actually, I don’t care whether there is cheese on it or not,
I just want you to spit on it”
customer two-twelve gets his chance, but defers
Coronado and his men parish in shame
the arrival of the free-thinker is deferred,
cheese, no ketchup. Please….
submersion into the heart of blightness
huge, gleaming tractors, proud combines
shameless, preening hoes
stretch for a hun’erd miles under a big midwestern sky
circumstantial evidence, deduction from absence
the genius and the arrogance, a deep-blue dive
swirling through the channels of the subconscious
marionettes on electric wires jerk and twist,
and all the while, the waters of the collective conscious exhibit
nary a ripple
kathy
Kathy, grim
2:30
seth smolders
seth
a doll’s house
A doll’s house
gleaming copper downspouts and red tar shingles
a dream kitchen, smuckers, wonderbread and pringles
carpet, and padding. stretching from wall to pastel wall
new clothes, designer labels, clean empty tables
a cat and dog. the little girl spends her days in many ways
three square meals and a healthy snack
fruit and fiber, just what the food pyramid says
but an architecture that she lacks
one little white girl, and one little boy black
the parents long-ago lost to the family dog
dismembered, buried and resting in pieces in the corner of the back
of the backyard, where lovely mah-jong tile headstones bear silent watch
every night, clean, damp, vinyl hair falls like finest floss
onto freshly washed and dried linen, still warm
dogs bark, and angry voices crow from somewhere down below
made reasonably unintelligible by the television’s blaring flow
muffled by the jungle-sounds cassette the girl plays nightly,
to ease hers into the netherworld, where no thing and no one can pass
No slights. No frights. Finally found, tightly gripped,
control.
Strangers come and strangers go, laughter vapors from below
the mornings are always the most peaceful, but one can never know
In the eve, the girl locks her door and sleeps
waits for the signs, listens, the third step creaks
a pocket knife and a serving fork tucked beneath her pillow
her children smile and shine as the first day they were found
islands in the stream but she stretches and grows,
ever more perfect with each sunrise
she fears her little ones will still need her, want her
love her when she goes
every night, vinyl hair falls like finest floss
onto colored, cut-up tablecloths
scavenged and sewn from common dross
little cups and dishes, plastic,orange and green
from three square and a healthy snack
rubbed and polished until they’re clean
another nether evening falls, retire
a prayer for the lost in the corner of the back, sleep.
coyotes call, dogs conspire,
there’s the creak of the third step
and it starts
road trip / vanishing point
Road Trip / Vanishing point
driving another junk car, leaving behind long, languorous shadows
traveling on gravel and on sand and on stone
over sagebrush and scores of unmarked graves
this is for fun or is this to atone
for sins still under consideration
We stop for trinkets in the sad ruins at casa grande
ask the waitress with cold, black-pool eyes
‘where’s the men’s room, she says, ‘when was the last time
you remember being happy’
she gets no fucking tip
from this place, from any place
the path of least resistance, is a turn to the south and cold warmth
on a graphical perspective, in a dimensional world
its where all the lines converge
color by numbers, fill in the blank
obituaries, horoscopes and crosswords
getting more lost, driving past unnamed mountains
without snow, and rivers without water
passing back and forth between the strange and the strangely familiar
footprints in the sand, assert, then disappear
who works the strings when bodies
with apparent motion, angst and vigor
appear and dance and jerk, then pass
a hole in the center where the jelly-soul used to be
I don’t know the moment when
the dust of our two spirits slipped
like light through haze into the space
where our bodies drift and hover
atoms, molecules, strong and weak forces
things with and without labels
mixed for a time, entwined, impressed
entangled and then fell away
how much water can you drink
from an oasis that’s ceased to trickle
my stern glaze, your indifference
the crest of a tide is fickle
maybe we will get it together
drift westward with the sun
slowly fading, extinguished by the blue to the west,
or north to the wind and to absence
romantic western narratives that will never happen
games the mind plays on itself
to occupy in void and absence, then into dust
shall pass, the wind will do what the wind chooses
it’s a little like a casual magic
idle amusement for beats and for slackers
an illusion without the pot-smoke and heavy mirrors
what transpires when destinies meet and merge
melt into the horizon, converge and disappear
the path of least resistance is a fall to the south and to the warmth
don’t wait, accelerate, drive on past the vanishing point
another milestone in an empty book of snaps
manufacture reason, method or motive
restless bodies become bodies lost in motion
once the momentum to leave is found
why would we ever want to stop
disappearing
turning the corners / dark world
Turning the corners / dark world
god says today I will make a mute
and tomorrow I will make a king
while planets spin and circle and trine
earthly dynasties and alliances fall in disgrace and ruin
then realign
the kings’ astronomer traces the oppositions and alignments
unconsciously touches the soft of his nape, in silence
watches as mars slows and pauses, then reverses
as if on queue, the whole world snarls
and goes gladly off to war in the provinces
the princess is taken from her hidden realm
smuggled surreptitiously under reckless plot
suffers fools and indignities. Sees beauty entangled with ugliness
feels the sting of peasantry and gravel for the first
on her soft and lovely virgin, white soles
she thirsts for water and hungers for color
is rewarded with random apportionments of debasement and irony
her soul pains to sing a song of honor and grace
something from somewhere other than this place
if she had only bothered to learn the words
somewhere opposite this sorrowful earth, bathed in so many greys,
mossy greens, hopelessness and darkness. a diametric to the sun
effortless, amidst a black sea of profanity and malice
china-white clouds bring sweet, spring rains, refract in buttery, golden hues
the ephemeral pleasures of the floating world, for which she will now forever be unfit
distilling meaning in the face of defeat
a princess longs but loses her lovely head
one must steel themselves for deceit
what is that expression so foreign
to men who work and live and toil
on the face of the dead and vanquished
one can discern the corners turn
peace, transcendence, and the hint of a smile
inspired by akira kurosawa’s ‘hidden fortress’
trinity
trinity
I am time, and I am light
I am a spark, and I am the ghost
circling a nucleus, the father and the son,
there is an inalieble elegance in the way it all works
I remember the trips we made on horseback in the foothills in the dark
and in the light. In radiance of full sun and in shadow of sun’s absence
Tarantulas and Agave. Scotch and Saltines.
Thoughtful men, thoughtful women, all
find comfort and purpose in work
arbeit macht frei
nature holds her secrets close
waiting for the assassin to steal
in a million years, what harm will come to pass
that couldn’t pass in a millionth of a second
a coyote calls, but goes unanswered
the sweat on her sweet neck glistens
in the light of a million vanquished stars
the weapon is poised but the will wavers
his deity councils; an action waits for you to accept
that I have already done everything for you
you are merely an instrument, you are nothing,
now do your piece
I am time and I am light
I am a spark and I am the ghost
descend, and the radiance of a thousand suns
slaughters the night
now I am become death,
the destroyer of worlds
dark muse 