3rd
“Watering Hole” part 6 (Twin Billions)
Close all the windows, nail them closed.
Friendly, though we be, we can kill on command.
Though we be friendly, we can kill the commander at the drop of a hat.
We can drop the commander off at daycare.
Wrapped in black taffeta (to temporarily blind us with our warm reflections)
The baby man is fevered beyond a popular grove,
To where a clearing comes to rest his bones.
There we are gathered here today, next to him and beside ourselves,
Beyond all the sadness we’ve ever known.
I, 17 in strapless dress and pushup bra, pair my eyes
(Through the steam that pours out of them), to see you,
On high pumps and in love with some sticks and stones, singing:
Sunshine, on my shoulders, gives me cancer.
Sunshine, in my eyes, can make me blind.
Constructed for war, your playhouse crumbles
Under the weight of its unity. A wholeness for breaking bones.
Your screams are ignored, can never hurt me.
“Bake me a cake as fast as you can,” we chanted around your body.
We got what we ordered, and withered.
Soon, you were just quaint, but hadn’t had enough movement to solidify.
You moved in a lump. When we sat you straight to read to you,
Your back would break like an icicle falling four stories.
Rather than take the risk, you plummeted sideways into our favorite fantasy:
Mark my words, Sunday will surprise you, and after that, doom.
Of course if you watch all that footage, its happening will
Take up in your head and play house with your finest china.
So I’m told, and to act as a self-censor I must cook for myself.
Baked for the freezer, however, our muffins taste burnt.
With some frosting, they become carbon cupcakes.
So I washed my saucer, it was on fire.
I pierced my pancake gut with a steeple spire.
Sunday loving brought me toast and brandy,
While the lonely chef directory warmed the fireplace to an empty room.
We reached the limits of the sun.
Now fire burning in a chamber underground pulls
Its oxygen from the telephone, singing “Phone tag, phone tag.”
Welcome to the beginning of the rest and all that.
