Clark Coolidge / Five Poems

Five Poems  by Clark Coolidge

CONJUNCTIONS:47, Fall 2006 LEGACY OF THE PLUG The pup is gone    want an amoeba? or an orange thing?    a “schizophrenic”? it’s marginal but we’ll play along the same vocabulary only fun this time I saw the roaring rush past the clock towers not even the starlings tried to hold on a breach of flying objects just the same to end it all you drop    understand? Tape ripped from the sides of scrapers with resounding smack they developed special lamps from the building fund after supper we made a little model to help us think it’s all vanilla or nougat at this point? These light boxes kept on strafing our neighborhood father came out all struck dumb from the bushes he was a replacement we realized after the habitual bulks had been hauled away at last We made our peace with the director of the piece a professional masochist named Rama Lama Dingdong then the credits caught fire lighting the beach goodbye to anything within reach THE NORMAL IS She’s like talking to a plate of lemon ice leads to nothing but sheared streets and Shetland sweaters the eyes won’t track properly    there’s something happening over there too    Jay Gatsby hung on a pier    I’d rather go to Peru get my heart broke in Cuzco for the elevation as if I somehow just popped up    I knew it raised a monster but didn’t turn out right all you do is shove somebody    go away screw your head on right reason for example oodles of confusion and addled high times usually parks her car on my dime    why do you think of stripes here?    there’s no point talking off the top of this nation of mistakes whole hills of burlap and beaverboard plus other tons of so far unlabeled whatever    all the shades of vitriol witness to the fall of youth and its dumbass regularity the worst part of growing up is the rest of your life FAR OUT MIDWEST I had a red outfit too one time then the aliens appeared    they showed me some miraculous products    artistic bath appliances    bare spots on bedroom walls where something once    don’t need to knock to enter the edge of a piece of paper not empty    I could go on...why doesn’t anyone?    meanwhile out at the source of the circus tent I burned my suit    after that the world smelled of velvet right to the cheek the closet    the settee    a photo of nothing we all should have been bred better and now there’s always something wrong    insects    well what do you want?    insects    in a blue moon someplace jazz is being made    beds rented I have news    buttons to push    which is which? eyeballs to fiddle with    knocks that sound like laughs they’re coming and you mustn’t mention me! these things mean to be taken seriously in a yellow cab back to Illinois I suppose all right let’s have it pumpkin rises in deserted pond A STORY CALLED MISTY Do you promise to laugh?    the one about the five thousand priests and the nine hundred dolls probably have that one on the wall of your office up all night with the realization    Tumbling Dice world without price    born a double palomino see you in the headlines probably the breadlines I can hardly see at all    the minutes seem to crawl most of our cereals come from Virginia the Piedmont the Delta some bishopric or other    are you my mother?    this is an homage to Williams to Stevens to Doodad    Nimrod    Abracadabra and the Cooties we met down on the farm    the foggy road to speleogenesis    not good enough?    Elaine May will save it in rewrite    secretly the snail is in the mail    I recognized your name on the weapon what no one else has dared to say: the sun sucks the drill cores have been misplaced    never saw the results we’ll gather later at Trees Lounge for the music alone    I feel Dizzy was almost removed from the show replaced by Cool Jerk    by the next in line by the scoopful    an expensive leather tetherball as a rule    tape your want list here drop a dime on no one    topspin is permissible always write your name in the center of the page A FEW WINDOWS PAST HARVARD I remember when the world was three the persons were not quite inhabitants yet but they were sad    chortles in short supply you’d think they’d learned to bend already I watched them carry out some very clear operations questions?    the morning when no different than usual was invented    play me some Schumann nothing was canceled due to rain golf ball or even slaughter    no homes to go to a slurry of a match useful at any rate the Godz were out of town    someday they will find a fossil with a serial number    forget the DNA comes in tubes with a gravity drive the Paleozoic starts with an overwrought thriller ends as one too    what a universe    all details determined by chance or necessity    one body gets away and we have nothing    whatever it will be found to be made of Ridiculum http://www.conjunctions.com/preview.htm