29 October 2007

pillow(talk)book

blood on the accordian
squelches glissando
of my past

dare I tell
the launey
who mouths me
in a dark labyrinth
that I can't forget
an actor's ass
before a fireplace
in a winter
long ago

nibbling at the corolla
of my ladhood
I think I taste
a boy who was pecans

each one returns
is that what
death is

or is this
a bad poem

maybe
death is
the worst poem

I look down
at his hair
a launce of macaroons
touching that corona
keeps me alive
one more nite

I write
in the morning
waiting for dark roast
to run over
my white keys

3 comments:

Steve said...

Any text with lines like "nibbling at the corolla / of my ladhood," "I think I taste / a boy who was pecans," "a launch of macaroons," "keep me alive / one more nite [because here the spelling "nite" seems so right, so apropos, so just plain neat, for some reason or another, and I'm not sure why I like it so much there, perhaps because it cuts the formality of some of the other extra-decorous words and thus gives them breathing room they need], and "waiting for dark roast / to run over / my white keys," perhaps my very favorite line in the poem, Cannot Possibly Be A Bad Poem for this reader.

The Courage of the poem, for it puts intimacy and vulnerability and heart and genuineness forward with stark, calm, quiet, steadfast self-assurance, makes it anything but a "bad poem."

And maybe death is the only bad poem, but even were that the case, this surely wouldn't be one, wouldn't be in any way "a bad poem."

Had I wrote it, it'd be "a keeper" for another reason, too. It captures what needs, wants, to be captured once and for all, does its job, makes concrete the very something that (I get the feeling, definitely) you wanted to make concrete and lasting and permanent.
It makes THAT "permanent." There are surely a zillion "functions" of
THE GOOD POEM. This one serves one of the very deepest functions and does so with decorum, authenticity, glissando, "class," and brevity. Well done, quite, then, yep.

Steve Tills

Alex Gildzen said...

Steve -- I'm overwhelmd. thank you so much.

if I die during the nite I want you to edit my Collectd Poems...

Steve said...

I would be deeply honored, Brother.

:) :)