Poetry: Ryan Quinn Flanagan

Ryan Quinn Flanagan

* Author of the Month: June 2019 *

Her Pockets Amaze Me

I think she will pull a trampoline

out of there,

not a functional trampoline perhaps,

but some jumping device of the mind

some herd of ideas lost to gallop

her freckled zig zag arms all over me

then back to those beautiful pockets

that denim warehouse of appetites

what comes next, a rainforest devoid of rain

perhaps?  long dark men at checkpoints

running machete over whetstone 

eyes bloodshot with a fresh day’s butchery

a wall of sun-bleached skulls that can’t stop

smiling at you, no, her pockets move too much

for impassive death so that I think she

might pull out all the coils from my couch

in a single delightful handful,

I have been looking for those for weeks

or maybe a barge named after the favourite

daughter of a blind shipping magnate with a curly

Greek name; surprise me I say, closing my eyes

until she is ready, my heart in my throat

beating the drums of a soaking red

imagination.

They All Dance

in that Raymond Carver story

with the drunk that has all his belongings

out on the lawn

and the young couple that come by

near dark

and try the bed out first,

the young man wanting to see if anyone is home

and the young woman telling him to always

offer $10 less for everything

and how the drunk comes out with his whiskey

and takes ten dollars less for both the bed and the television

then sits on the sofa and sells them the record player

and pours them all drinks

and puts on an old record and dances with

the young woman well into the night

before the young couple drive away with all

the man’s belongings

and somehow you know that even though

they are just starting out

they will be where the drunk is in twenty

or thirty years and that just for that one night

the old drunk has enjoyed a bit of his youth

for one last time.

About That Silly Monster Time

Mr. Marcel Proust!  If your books were any skinnier

they would be Miss Universe contestants.  Handing out

world peace like some greasy spoon turning out scrabbled

on white breakfast specials.  The sign in the window

says: Coiffure and I wonder why the French keep winning wars.

Maybe they are doing it in my sleep and their victories are

merely my dreams.  The tricolour draped over my face

like a snoring bridal veil.  And vows are a funny thing, aren’t they?

I think we enjoy the idea of permanence because our lives

are all so ephemeral.  Like water over the hands and down

down the drain where they say alligators live with sewage

workers.            

              

I don’t need a phonebook to call the cat.  He never comes anyways.

I figure he is off killing something in the dark and who am I

to interrupt a murder?  That is the job of the law.  Or the conscience.

Either will do.  I figure you have about fifteen good years left

in you before the cashiers start calling you ma’am.

He Tried to Pay for Lunch in Denarius

It’s not a far walk at all.  I do it at least three times a week.

In clothing I have picked out for the occasion.  Too young for

a walking stick and too old for some raving milk mad mother

to wheel me along. I am in the middle like a slow dance

in a crowded gymnasium.  The way Sister Ruth comes by

with the ruler to measure the distance each body must be apart.

And Roman is proud of his nose.  Believes his parents named

him after an empire and not his grandpa Roman who

always smelled of truck exhaust before he died. 

Roman touches his nose each time the waitress comes by

thinking she will she his greatness and fall in love right there

over the pastrami and pickle.

I don’t know what to tell you about the windows.

All the buildings have them.  And the delivery guy that

races around always knowing exactly where to go

even though there are no addresses.  I am much more

the tree sloth.  It could take me half a

millennia to do anything.

The librarian hates me because I know what I want.

She doesn’t get to show off and that seems to irk her.

Always raising an eye in disapproval of my choices.

I came for ideas, my dear, not a good racking.

The shops are there in case you have a hankering.

And the money of course.  Do not forget Roman

and how he tried to pay for lunch in denarius.

The walk home is best because I am alone.

Even the ridiculous bread crust pigeons

wanting nothing to do with foot traffic.

Big Screen Queen

She had her day,

I’m sure you’ve seen those

many old posters that yellow and curl

at the edges like a newborn’s fingers,

mere collector’s items now

much like our big screen queen

would be if the zoo started housing

such things, but they don’t, not yet anyways

and the posters sit behind glass

on the walls of the financially well-endowed,

there is a real temerity to the ogling

that goes on over smoky aperitifs

and our queen used to be a real looker

always heavily made up and staring off

into the distance as though there were something

just over your shoulder

but when you look, there is nothing

but careful chesterfield leggings

and a silver coaster,

surely she cannot be impressed

with that; our darling celluloid Everest

with that whisper of a voice always

inventing such fine secrets.

Setu, June 2019