Barbecue
Little remove
I straddle
as prehensile limb took
initiative
with my own
nationwide guarantee
Took gross
tonnage by merit
suspended from price index
atavistic
junkyard satellite
transmitting code announcing
that fifty
years of pollution
is career enough to retire early
How else
rate service when
the best oxygen has gone away
Little remove
I straddle
by choice of lawn furniture
stained
with catsup and blood
in equal parts I can't tell apart
Creature
comfort divine
on the grill but doesn't
see the
value daylight
never takes for granted
It's luxury
I do covet
in defense here now
of a faded
frontier cushion
with gravy on the side
Nocturne
Once they were dim pockets
frayed and brittle arms
during the souvenir invasion
homesick
for anything
beating softly in the firmament
in the murky
glare of glass
in narcotic waves over the desert
as a child
later than this
smear of trajectory
from dome
car passage
would take endurance
and suddenly
I'm awake
and beside me is a reason
to keep going back
Copyright © Spencer Selby, 2005.
Spencer
Selby lives in Oakland, California. He was born and
raised in the midwest of the USA, started SINK Press in the
early 1980s and co-ordinated the Cannessa Park Reading Series
from 1987-1993. He is the author of seven volumes of poetry,
three of visual poetry, and a study of film noir called Dark
City (McFarland & Co, 1997, 2nd edition).
