Monday, December 1, 2014

Cruise Crackers


I.
Desert lips
reach into Long Beach
and the Queen Mary marooned
while seagulls gloat

II.
Pre-Raphaelites before swine,
the Mad Hatter, Gatsby and Atlas
who holds rococo grapes to column tops
as the floating buffet escapes from time
on the strictest of clocks

III.
A happy song about revenge killing
in the late afternoon sun over tea
on the high seas

IV.
A blue rubber flower bathing cap
makes the infant wearing it smile
like there's joy in growing out of the earth as separate

V.
The women stare over the rails
like Roman mermaids with implied swords,
stretching bikini'd torsos
while a ginger girl holds a black and white ice cream cone
for all girls

VI.
The houses fall up the hills in Mexico,
where they distill themselves into colors to sell
but you cannot see the moustache in the mirrors by the beaches
or hear the shiny trumpets in the Latin of the parrots