The Poetry Of...
Al Ferber.................................................
No Tipping, Please
Every early morning
about 3:00 AM
on my way home
after counting my bank
and closing the bar
I'd pass them standing
in the street near the
corner: short-tight
mini skirts - smoked
or fishnet stockings-
knee high boots
exposing meaty thighs -
skimpy tops revealing
long cleavage of
ample breasts - smiling
as only pros can do,
inviting me to partake
of all seven deadly sins.
And every early morning
I made passionate love
with every one of them
in the privacy of my mind,
listen to the stories
of their lives, aspirations,
sexually abused childhoods,
their children, bouts
with sexually transmitted
diseases, abuses: verbal
and physical from various
customers. And then
I'd kiss them gently
on the forehead
and say good night.
So Many Things
I don't understand prisms,
kaleidoscopes, rainbows,
auras, magic potions, faith
healing, patriotism,
the stock market, the meat
market, super markets,
Super Bowl Sunday, final
markdown sales, clearance
sales, Soupy Sales, Jerry
Lewis, Ronald McDonald,
Disney Land, Disney World,
The United Nations,
The United Arab Republic,
The World Series, Born
Again Christians, tactical
warfare, cease fires, vacuum
cleaners, dust busters, canned
heat, impersonal hatred,
statutes of limitations,
walks for hunger, High
Holy Days, the motion
of the ocean, and lots
more things, so I'll read up
on them and get back to you later.
Straight Into Hell
Drifting off to sleep
this time on a train
on my way to
the New York Penn
Station connection
that would take me
to the Long Island
Railroad connection
that would take me
to Long Island
and in that nanosecond
it took to close my eyes
the surreal landscape
and scenarios began to
populate the theater
screen of my subconscious:
the insurance company
actuarial with all the
wrong numbers making
a presentation to the
board of directors
for the state hospital
for the terminally sane,
the druggist doling out
prescriptions of dramamine
to unwed mothers who’d
forgotten to breast feed
the in absentia fathers,
mustachioed penis sales-
ladies from dildo factories,
my first wife in the bloom
of her madness making
a pre-torching paper origami
of our tiny apartment
in consort with devils,
bringing with her the evil
children of endless night
the young dead eyed sons
and daughters
of demon darkness
wearing her soot stained
wedding dress
deep charcoal eye shadow
and thick black lipstick
she beckoned me to the
anal sex of her abused
childhood and our mutual
eternal damnation.
