I SCREAM YOU SCREAM

If it wasn’t going to happen,
We were not used to setting out
At pains toward an arrival
Out of state, past lunch,
And her apron lacking a tie.
The kitchen would have to be,
In spite of the efforts
Of Flumesack Fonda,
Retiled. In our distaste,
We had not planned for this.
It was suggested that we
Intend one discomfort
Until that she snake off
Under a shorn hedge
On a dog day
Of the warm season
As the trees teem
With whispered
Capitulations
And the soft places
Are filled.

Our indications had been
At every turn, pilling
And the mannerisms
Of the bricoleur
Were waterage
On a soaked log
Hovering as a colored egg
After you have washed your hands
And basted the bird.
This is when you think
To arrange a meeting
Between the chef d’ecole
And the collards
At an undisclosed location
Disclosed even to you
Where you manifest
Verily as of air
In the confines of a tub.

He’s obviously in need
Of a light nudge,
Give him your card.
Direct him to the full man
On the nothing moon
Brooming his minor mastery
Of forks and intriguism
While you browse other things
And the people speak to you
Of the period of darkness
Up in the gods
And the admission too steep,
A friend unsuffisant
In a luxurious den,
A yielding diminished
By braggarts and their hands
Clogged with cake,
Squirting marzipan lotion
On persons engaged
In billowing
Their bowels at you,
Which you had no part
In planning.

But what I mean to be ignoring
Has presented
And I have no other recourse
But to reckon a mackereled
Point with specific games
Involving tops.
Has now your progress
Eclipsed you? Care for
A leather strop?
Are you open?
Are you open to this?

Daniel Brian Jones edits FOLDER (www.foldermagazine.com). Poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Prelude, Vector, Chronogram, Whirlwind, Spilled Milk, Opossum Holler Tarot, Blast Furnace, and Modern Poetry Review. Music: Harmonium Songs (settings of Stevens poems), Little Room (songs). He is an instructor at the Atlantic Acting School in Chelsea. Upcoming: the theatrical world premiere of John Ashbery’s Litany, in collaboration with dancer/choreographer Sarah Haarmann. www.danielbrianjones.com.