Field And Stream

 

Wisps of acrid smoke shimmer in

the shy rays of the rising sun.

Crows like motes in a bleary eye

circle, hypnotized by the smell of burnt

flesh and glint of twisted metal.

 

A broad stream runs through the field

and in its icy depths a slender figure

struggles, her rose-tinted gills fluttering

weakly, born down as she is by the

unforgiving weight of modern arms.

 

 

 

The Aggregate Man

 

She likes to introduce him as a man

of many parts – her little joke –

occasionally she goes on to demonstrate,

enumerate the provenance of his

various bits and pieces,

 

Here’s something we picked up in Cairo

not quite a perfect fit

but one can’t have everything

and, oh yes, this doodad cost a pretty penny

but we just had to have it.

 

Because his movements tend to be rather

jerky, not quite suited to cocktail-party

mingling, she prefers him

to stand in the corner once the show

is over, out of harm’s way.

 

So there he stands now, motionless,

his mismatched eyes

shifting almost imperceptibly, tracking

the random motion of bodies

and admiring their component parts.

 

 

 

Baltimore native Jeffrey Park lives in Munich, Germany, where he works at a private secondary school and teaches business English to adults. His poems have appeared in Requiem, Deep Tissue, Danse Macabre, Crack the Spine, Right Hand Pointing and elsewhere, and his digital chapbook, Inorganic, was recently published online by White Knuckle Press. Links to all of his published work can be found at www.scribbles-and-dribbles.com.

 

Listed at Duotrope
Listed with Poets & Writers
CLMP Member
List with Art Deadline
Follow us on MagCloud