Ethereal Beauty #46

The guard dogs slobber over front paws caulked
With sentimental sediment of elegies.
Scalp o' mine switching like bristled walrus whiskers,
They lazing, obese, on zoo cement. I ponder
Fenugreek seeds shaped like entrails as they trail
In leaf-clotted spoors to my first home in the dell.

I ride wobbly on an ass, hump the saddle-knob
Viciously, cuff temples twixt dialing my Muse
And crying to an invisible audience.
Alert wardens of purgatory, divest
My sackcloth of embedded bees, beatitudes;
Hasten my muddled dominion over rats.

Frequent guided missiles cosy up to me
Like alarm clocks covered in mistletoe,
Holy pricks, jangling at four in the morn.
I throw the belvedere dormer window wide
When hearing legions of barking curs scrapping
The guard dogs replenished with my greasy chapbooks.

Forward, Christian soldiers, the trenches are piled
With uncontrolled Xerox copies multiplying
My best poem, number five-nine-five-nine
(A particularly soppy one where
I wikipedia an Ontario town
And depress her with cut-and-paste proficiency).

Radishes! Buns of valour! Valerie waiting
In a fevered dream for my sixteen-liner.
Crawling through my vasectomy, I see
Blue ribbons tightening my throat's girth
In fastidious horror. O wake me, nurse!
Bathe me, order more horse meds, clean my pipe!

I see black horses in a squadron, chamfrons'
Iron splitting the air with sick gleams
As the military procession halts,
Caracoling savagely over frightened sheep.
Plasma leaks from my ears, winsome eyes of colts
Beckon me to sing my past pejoratives.

I raided the bake sale and Raided silverfish
At the five-and-dime, which is more than I got
At the streetcorner shouting mini love epics
To passersby during Yuletide. You'll hide,
Yul Brynner, when I throw my clammy
Trousers in the ring and declare victory.

I'm the victor! More poems than tears at
‘Titanic’ 's first showing in Yankee Stadium;
More admirers than W B Yeats
In a potato-photo-op with Maud Gonne;
More bouquets than Tom Jones received wailing
‘Delilah’ with no jockey shorts. Janitor!

Wash my corns with soap. These coupons I inspect
Help with my vocabulary, the lettering
Not belligerent. Where’s the cake, frosted
With ‘Crappy dearth. Hey?’ in long purple loops
As I purse my lips and blow? Hark! A lemon ….
No. Just a stray Buick on the outs from Linda.

Palsied sheep, confess, we've been good for each other.
I brag like an indentured little shaver
Hiding in barns where the corn tops the silos
Like stocking stuffers a popular family
Member gets for being good one day a year.
Drama. Dull dendrites. Dire dandruff. Duffle bags

Of disease. Derailed, my dentures, with spotted flecks.
These cityfolk do complain when my tractor
Throws me off, the shift-stick toggle loosing
Like a manic Janet Reno bobblehead
As it crashes the Jaguar showlot,
Shovelling staff, infecting Pledge-lined floors.

Atremble, I initiate a half-gainer
From the ceiling-fan, and land on my parched head.
Who said life’s easy? Throw me in the briar patch.
I get the willies every Sunday at noon
(Stuck needle of parson; hymnals of arson)
Till a capsule capsizes my sadness.

Lines of wise men pass my manger, managing
To quell my lust for visitors. Round (yon surgeon)
About eight I’ll break into my fond hospital
Paramour-den. Meantime I halt and shudder
For a sour relic of my work. Confused, alone,
The air leaves my lungs. A blue cloud kisses me home.