Five poems by Gary Lundy

euphonic young man speaks makes musical

toothless enamor sign. enameled direct detour. bound in glass shards. brilliant antediluvian summation. anonymous name resource collection. condition form mouth open signature. hideous sentence in repeat to self forgetting.
 
mere yellow blue. saxophone piano. drum machine childs voicing laughter. hammer blows. couplet changeless chart accompaniment. sequence collective. sorrow aside ready help. a dream fracture. dispel garb theorem. enough being already said.
 
pleasure foolish retrieval. concordant dissipation. all other time's a waste. splendidness ineffable. tremors in fabulous sounding. a children perfect laughter. cross street sparkle. soft dark vocal accompany missing page. water spread faux word view.
 
interval of two rapid blows. one. one. zero. a thought dream mid breath. walk jagged four apart. city tree light line sporadic shallow. nice warm her place pillow splatter. instant caesura motility. why engage in delusional comforter. no thing alive gains better breadth. a breath of wander laughter.





oblong deniability. raw genital denial

age accomplice. and she will leave. even though music threads small moments. a fabric glass shards. red.
 
turn the lights out. swallow darkens like your last lover. run as if your heart depends upon it. never say. to preserve accompanies your open mouth.
 
words swallow time stopped. watch as an old man. challenges. wants to run his fingers through your hair. can it be possible survival a cruel hoax.
 
smooth white paper glossy. they bend over their practiced conversation. attempt to obliterate the other with counter top blows.
 
erase discomfort. stay just above surface thinking. entertain audible doubts. don't touch my fucking beautiful hair. don't assume a hug will help.
 
touch beams down upon unsuspecting. enunciation. it still hurts. while the pain driven farther away. ignorance a claim of justification.
 
yet she remains dead. her years added up to meeting you.
 
a lovely infant sits divided by proud parents. the measure now orchestral. runny nose and cold extremities.
 
always now you will be attached. to the mispronounced word work. and your correction. concoction brews steam through a moonless night.
 
you at least had a chance to see her briefly today.
 
tears effortless. a marine murders. against the details of attraction. life perceived as worthless. diffidence.





instigate alternative. glue unhinge psyche 

like gross entertainment. entrapment. voices strike hard against minds window. inauthentic laughter. as they approach shoreline. fragrance from flower trees. each night three or four bees struggle die. i enjoy the fist pump last night. what gives.
 
the goings on of bird chirp. chips salsa korean cuisine. a rectangular tattoo. some blue yellow red. shoulder expose. unhappiness derives from harried. responsible seductive. leave early before any one notices. a shoulder beautiful see through blouse. clean a french press. not know vinegar you.
 
stop in place. listen as those brown eyes cloud up. a rainstorm unlooked for. today center in self a pure nothing. it is not just that he looks askance. asleep roommate bludgeons with hammer. permanent brain injury. afraid to be turn in to love. in to wants him.
 
in precisely that way. if you are. i would like to. a melody articulates between notes play. misrepresentation. reality is never as refined as imagination. a hoarse cough engine.
 
have you left already. he writes to expand each word. each sentence. from within. get at truth. leave with unquenched fatigue. still she embroiders. although her eyes barely see light from dark. a blouse drapes a shoulder reveals. he thinks i am cute. but not so much in the photograph.
 
a name so common. anonymous. cover in by increments in smaller tighter print. until forestall decompress. go back reread. in order to get it right. jot even or odd numbers. along a line between yes maybe. the spine book broken page falls out. a childs darling excitement.





the miserable old man. his two old man friends

who wear entitlement draped over their shoulders. their proud hats. carry their unexamined fear. to be thus. moved to put his miserable old man fingers through your hair.
 
a high risk of violence. you don't drop your pen like soap. bring out the feeble best of what's left as his dried up desire. flu shots. habitual distrust.
 
fight against words potential placement. it hurts. such lethal miscommunication as fear. they all might be.
 
can it ever be. that you have ever seen in another your self reflection. that standing eye to eye. the way forward blocked.
 
as a child you love to look at photographs of naked or near naked women. exhilarating. only later do you understand. it is not that you want them.
 
not like the miserable old man wants to put his feeble fingers through your hair.
 
you want to be them. to be at least one of them. then to have the old stupid mans desire to be more than fingers. more than your pink hair.
 
but this realization quietly recedes into the cluttered past. until a boy wants you like the other boys want girls. and you learn a different method of pleasure and insertion.
 
yet by the time you admit this to yourself you have spent years as a man. a real man.





or the friend who says to you. if i could

go that way i'd go that way with you. or the other friend who repeats almost verbatim. words through different year in a different location.
 
stop it. too late. too late. invisibility cloaks you in such perfect placement. so that only your hair appeals. even to the miserable old man. who has never thought of putting his fingers in another mans hair.
 
earlier you see a beautiful young man. long auburn hair blows lightly in wind.
 
immediately your beautiful friend returns. the night when the two of you sit on your motel bed. your friend all decked out. to the nines as they say. beautiful blouse skirt heels. her auburn hair full and lovely.
 
how when she touches your legs she exclaims they are smoother than hers.
 
in that moment you want a dress and heels. instead remain in clothing as disguise.
 
it is never so much the saying. but the being that rests squarely upon your shoulders. the fear engendered when his mother calls to ask you to pray for her son. whose unambiguous presence remains a hard strong rule.
 
behavior that warrants the miserable old man to block and mock. to want to put his frail old mans fingers in your hair. to rough it up perhaps. like you are merely a scruffy confused young boy found out and happily made fun of.
 
to explain a pleasure so ripe that as he tightens in your mouth and throat. you tighten in your pants.
 
to change clothing. to finally feel beautiful and accepted. as the woman you are behind the boots flannel hanging in your closet.



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 About the author: gary lundy was a professor of english at the university of montana western until 2011. each july he is an instructor of the mandolin building class at rocky grass academy, in lyons, colorado. gary’s poems have appeared most recently in: Yellow Chair Review; Guide to Kulchur the Journal; The Maynard; The Main Street Rag; and, After Happy Hour. his book, heartbreak elopes into a kind of forgiving, will be published this spring by is a rose press.

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