August 11–17, 2008: Jeffrey Spahr-Summers and Randy Van Otterloo

strip poetry

one poem for each piece of clothing
she says so i read her some carver
the first poem is short but poignant
off comes my shirt tossed to the dogs
i count the many poems she requires
i quickly pick another poignant piece
and i am curious about socks after all
they are identical .now two poems
she says this is harder than you think

next to me

in the cafe a man pours
his coffee onto his saucer he
slurps from it like a horse
greedily but slow
deliberate he
pulls a half-eaten bagel
from his tattered
yet magical paper bag
smears a psychedelic sort
of soft serve butter
with a flourish
across the top
and suddenly he
clucks
like a chicken/there it is
like a chicken
consumed
by the task at hand

octopus’s garden

no one has seen the octopus
in some time and
the garden is unkempt
peering through the murky
brewing underworld
of mud and poison and oil
we see the old bone yard
skeletal remains of old feasts
and bloated half-eaten fish
that nothing will touch

it looks like there may
have been a struggle