grated painted galloping carton of bodies.
grated painted galloping carton of bodies.
by meghan tennison
this brand new and improved vaseline lipstick gently treats you like
the thinnest of baby skin;a bottled genuine form of sympathy,
listenhearabsorb you’ll be forced to soon; they’ve got these sneaky
sound machines now, you know.
so let’s close our eyes and wish for a tornado ride home.
we stand at the welcome mat of their capital doll house
a scent of plastic limbs carefully placed, displaying
dinner,mossy fountains,letting each know when the other wants to
brush their teeth or take a ride on the backyard roller coaster,
pet goats sporadically itching barbecue chords all the way down the mountain stairs.
yeah, i think i dropped the key
to the hiding places of my body.
hi, don’t talk to me. i’ve got a date
with this blueberry pie and the tattoo parlor and the beach.
somewhere far and not so set-on-fire.
a rock fell off the moon and it dreamt of dark submarines,
entrapped: cages leaking dog gelatin whose personalities evaporated
just this last week- so close you were, detective! and anyway,
your face was gray, i let my fingertips taste
and they reported: “a marriage-
he smells just like the aftermath of your honeymoon’s nest!
you gotta buy into it, granny, who knows when it’ll last.”
that soap opera there did not apply to any blood cell i own, but
my shadow mingles
with it
somehow.
i said yesyesyes until i agreed that i will never know what to agree on
truthfully,atleast . 4 stories high
our sweaty, hungry-for-pizza flock sat on top of black trees.
level-headedness miles that way, pointer-finger said:
“in that plane ejecting pink lemonade exhaust, lingering something
filmstrip-innocent.” good.i’ve been meaning
to get rid of that, but my money’s garbage man had instead.
rodent smile,epilepsy gaze,shy songs bubble through her giggles.
strings stretch,gasp,fall — until thoroughly cracked.
hasn’t school ever taught you? never be humpty dumpty,
your body breaks and so does the rest of your luck.
it would seem like nobody knows how to talk anymore. maybe something
happened to our planet? “nope,
just yours,
robot-person.”
you cry like a tiger. i like it when you
bite your lip before shooting a gun.
let’s go play in the toy store,
in the soap shop, in the lingerie aisle;
let’s spray four different perfumes on our backs because
we are modern skunks; let’s follow the train tracks
to civilization, to chinese food; let’s eat lunch in the alley,
nexttoallthese strangers, withallofthese strangers
who transformed into what not even they had predicted;
let’s make wax castles
using all the candles in this abandoned house;
let’s play cribbage and eat cap’n crunch;
let’s have a picnic
on the highest hill of the graveyard,
by that blowhole,
on our roof.
let’s get drunk and go skinny dipping,
pee ourselves, and then wake up
with piss all over the bedsheets.
dude! i mean, holy shit! you just wrote that yesterday, and it’s already published. that’s pretty impressive. i love this poem so much and that’s all you’re gonna get, ‘koos i already told you i want to live in it. ( :
Hi,
I’m new to “haggard & halloo” so haven’t had a chance to really dig into the poems published here. BUT I did want to say that your poem really caught my eye and my imagination. I like the way it juxtaposes this “surrealness” with a sort of conversational “earthiness” with the placement of “Kerouacky word compounds.” I don’t know if I’m being clear but I did want to leave a comment that I like your poem.
Supercalifragilistic-expealidocious! i read this poem in-between routes in my Mack Truck and have to say it’s one of my favorites of H&H for the year thus far!
…Definetly one of those pieces i wish i had written… it didn’t strike me so much as surreal, but as youthful rebellion in the face of manifested life itself…TRADITION VS. REVOLUTION…and the sheer will to make it real and happy goddammit! Killer title! From the very beginning i detected a mock commercial tone…if you want to cut something down to size or even destroy it, use that thing’s vehicle (mockingly) to create your own power (like Punk Rock using Pop as a vehicle to undermine Pop; or as a nihilistic device to pave the way for a new wave).
So, anyways, how’s about that idiom…poem talks directly to reader thus in effect making it a ‘group adventure’. There’s imagination with connectivity that specifically vague enough to cascade thru images which reverberate thru our blank slated minds…in a theme centered upon finding cleanliness (aka. purpose?). Sensual with girly testosterone…there is texture and feel and a cozy down-home eccentricity popping the switch of electric treasure trove in a revised Pee-Wee’s playhouse pleasure dome. All 6 senses are reignited and purely delighted.
I never really thought of Carpe Diem as getting drunk, going skinny dipping, and pissing one’s bedsheets thoroughly, but i do now!
Hurrah for the long poem, by the way, nice to see a fellow enthusiast.
P.S. “i’ve got a date with this blueberry pie…” is code for you’ve got a thing for Jude Law to the tune of Nora Jones…any creedence?
hahahahaha not my place to answer but unlikely
i’m a very big fan of meghan’s work. there are a few people on this site that we don’t bother to read right away when reviewing their work. we simply notice who the poem is by, read the first few lines to remind us of its nature and if its the right time, we’ll post it instantly.
meghan is one of those.
sometimes you just like anything someone does because they always speak with that one, consistent and honest voice.
that’s fun.