| Thunder Sandwich #17
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 dweeb by jeff filipski |
| Hiss A respirator's feeble hiss is all we have for autumn winds. I arm myself by doubling up on Dixie cups -- fetching ice, hoping sadness won't escape like nipples showing through a shirt. Heavy feet are marching halls, catching on the cracking tile. I feel the claws on banging screens -- the gritty cat that whines for milk and settles for the water drop. Your roommate's mattress stripped so bare it could be tombstones setting awful precedents. Drapes are shut, their iron curtains, wool dividers of the silk. You spend your birthday in a bed. A candle in a cupcake sits; this quiet's almost smothering. Lights are dim as if they know how darkness has the upper hand. Nothing to do but salve and weep, shuffle stacks of tattered cards. Respect a closing symphony for all the scales it leapt with grace. I pat the blankets down like dogs. Fuss with clothing. Wipe your chin. Bathe the wound as if I guess how deep it goes. I listen to your fading lungs -- mashed potatoes turning to a lukewarm cloud. Angels have a Daphne scent that levels tart ammonia rain. Mushroom Caps Tomorrow is always a queasy plank. I'll spend the winter's oiled cloud with my chin in the cup of your shoulder blade. Cross my toes with yours, genuflect against the pressing thump of time. These days, the carousel is tired, but we went to the summer fair, slobbered cotton candy style, wore translucent pink on rolled-up, wrinkled sleeves. We drew the unguarded breath, took a long drag off the shortened stick. We popped a button in the gust of reach. I stare at your face, its creased mosaic, veins of sapphire miming the moon at dusk. Eyelids of old mushroom caps, this is our lot, this sag. When the sack breaks into the manger of death, I shall know we loved as mosquitoes bite, swell, explode. Leaving a mark behind. This dream did do that nervous jump, land on haggard fours, sway to the jazz of the dance, consider the sweat a perfect rain that went to puddle, then to stream, then to river, then to sea. The curve of the shore was worth this salt |
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| ISSN: 1534-4037 |
Edited by Jim Chandler & Haze McElhenny
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