Panhellenic Remonstrance

 

She sees Milton lurching forward

when his heavy head is on Big O’Eye’s

left shoulder to fix the whole damn

thing up before she becomes a limp,

that delicate-looking gentle barmaid.

Ms Mill who’s just entered the corridor

from the large hall shallows her anger & turns

with hard smile, hard to paint with bright colours,

the sun is dim & rainclouds gather.

Lying crosswise, these trees in the oak wood

after the hurricane & all that’s turning out

to be so serious in the tears welling up,

she picks herself up & scrambles out.

Suddenly, Milton motions us forward with

a commanding gesture, several people are blown

with their noses to sing the recessional.

The fellow resembles her mother

in the colour of her eyes & the way she walks

with a preliminary rumble of rumours,

he walks away, rumbling in the distance.

In the kitchenette from back down the aisle,

she spreads the ginger-bread marked

with Kitemark & ogles before O’Eye

& suddenly she lights the stove

& squats in front of this artifact on the radio

but all she can do is counting her fingers.

“Our Lady, wait a second. Let me finish.

I can’t read & listen at the same time

when I find it hard to begin a new paragraph.”

The candle burns on the bench.

A shadow on the wall ossifies.

It seems plausible, he thinks,

she’s left with a mirror below the surface

of his absence, silence & darkness.

In the small circle room behind them

is filled with shipwrecked men

& a female nurse is in attendance.

She cries, “No! Keep your voice low.”

She wears a T-shirt with a butterfly motif,

her grey eyes are scattered in the room.

A man with his thin black moustache

is winking at her, too far out

of sight to count for the next position,

where a messenger remains sunless. 

A dark figure obscures the lighted doorway,

Beth, a waitress wishes she could

stay there forever when her younger brother

is willing to take his day that way,

O’Eye hesitates to open his door,

she completes dressing their wounds.

Buffalo Blue can be heard for miles.

Tethered only by a collar & chain,

snarling the crowd peering at him

through open bars, his trainer

loosens his tie he wears, biting his lips,

his invisible smile on her face surfaces.