..........
.............The Poetry Of
................ Wayne Noone
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Approaching Sandusky Street
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Watch me summon the dead.
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See her barreling through the mist
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in her blue chariot
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down Fort Pitt Boulevard
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at my command.
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I will compel her to tell me,
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despite the cancer and lupus that hieroglyphs
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her skin,
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the steroids inflating
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her head,
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tell me the secrets of the dead,
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why there is something
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and not nothing.
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As we fly across the Sixth Street Bridge
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I will stare at her admiringly,
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how lifelike her wig looks,
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how waxen her sheen,
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and she will split her face in half
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so she can keep one eye on the road,
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and whisper in my ear
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sweet nothings.
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We and Bernie Mac
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One day he'll just stroll in, Bernie Mac.
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Course we always knew he was coming
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just never sure when.
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He'll arrive around supper time,
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might like to have a ham sandwich
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or a little soup, and
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he'll sit down on the couch,
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the soft one where your butt sinks to the floor,
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and he'll be sitting there in his porkpie hat
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with his knees rising to his chest and his pants
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sliding up revealing his gleaming shins
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and he'll be making us laugh,
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telling his jokes,
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bugging his eyes out like he does,
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and when he thinks we're okay
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he'll tell us its time to go.
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We won't argue with him,
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its no use, and after all we always knew
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there'd come a time when
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we'd have to take a drive.
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We'll take Bernie's car,
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a big old Ford Galaxie, eight cylinders.
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It'll be more roomy for her in back
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he'll say,
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so we'll help her in the car, careful
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with her oxygen,
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and Bernie'll be very soft with her,
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fixing a pillow behind her head,
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making sure she's alright and comfortable.
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I'll ride shotgun,
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I won't be left behind,
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and off we'll go.
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We'll ride down 60 through Heidelburg
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past John Dewey Junior High to the place
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she and I used to go,
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when we'd take a blanket from her car
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to lie on under the stars,
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and I'll point it out to her and ask her
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if she remembers and she'll shake her head
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as best she can.
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We might get a little bit wistful,
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but Bernie'll shake us out of that,
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doing his schtick, bugging his eyes,
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looking pretend mean over his sunglasses.
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Then we'll head out
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to the highway
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past where the mills and everything
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used to be.
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And it'll be alright, I guess,
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going down the road,
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me and her and Bernie Mac.
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Ghost of John Bell Hood
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or
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How I Spent My Summer Vacation
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I'm standing outside the Peachtree Mall
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near Columbus GA
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having stepped out the backdoor of the Ruby Tuesday's
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for a cigarette
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and I'm wobbly on my feet
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with four days of fever and the chills
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and the four Advil
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haven't quite kicked in.
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I'm looking at the rolling behinds
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of young southern womanhood
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for a barometer of just how sick I am
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nothing, that's bad,
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so I'm back inside eating something with pasta and shrimp
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like every other something up north
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except they serve sweet tea and talk funny
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and after some blurry conversation
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we're back at the Best Western
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this is right next to Alabama mind you
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so the heat is southern hot
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but I've got two blankets on plus
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the comforter and sheet
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everything kind of gray
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and drifting
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and at one point I'm up and at the foot of the bed
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stands Hood
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there of course because he had something to do
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in my mind with Atlanta and Franklin
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the Lost Cause
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and the fall.
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His twin button uniform is twined
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sagebrush and kudzu
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sleeves braided spanish moss
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epaulets of prickly pear
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medals cross his chest holding
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faded cameos of Wallace and L.B.J.
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Medgar Evers and Earl K. Long.
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He's standing there in our prefab motel room,
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I know this doesn't make sense
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but I have a fucking fever so bear with me,
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pointing with his good arm
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and saying y'all think it's about the niggers
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but it's not.
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It's about you
you fat assed hunky lying pale under those sheets
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with your swollen belly
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and flaccid cock,
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its about how y'all just fold everything
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into your own fat.
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I'm looking at that long face and mournful eye
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thinking about the chills and the long drive home tomorrow
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and how I've never even tried
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one of their peaches.
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