for Gypsy Queen
There are women like her still, the rowdy ones, fearless, will walk up to you and kick you in the shins or haul back and coldcock you or whatever a brave woman does who refuses to be silenced. If I know one I know a hundred, and it's time you know and call their names, the bloody sea is rising, the truth is like an eel, who else but her will bear your heart to the grave . . . Who but the gypsy in my dream, in my country the lass who spurns the queen . . .
I woke at three, having slept since midnight the deep sleep, yet shallow as the soul. On the screen was Cate Blanchett who had climbed inside the Dubliner's lovely body and made herself at home, knowing full well the price. Why say it's only a movie? and an old one at that. Its music reminds me of my mother, and you. Like her, who also loved me over a half century, you wake in the wee morning hours and go to sleep with the pre-dawn light . . .
(4:15 ante meridiem, 20 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Friday, August 22, 2014
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
Buena
Buena is off to the right
or to the left . . .
the direction the car
is traveling the back road
to or from the dam
the salmon run, hurdling
the falls to reach the calm
spawning waters
if first the Yakama don't spear
them climbing the ladder.
Buena is where
the Guzmans live.
Frank talks while I take
an hour to eat my lunch
on the grass
outside Employment Security
in Toppenish. Frank's wife
Geri takes classes
with Cathleen in Yakima,
at The Beauty School.
Frank knows I live here
alone, where Cathleen was
better-looking than the others.
You need a wife, she said,
I've got a wild hair up my cunt
I need to tame.
Frank asks what I do for pussy.
You mean, Where does my
Little Man go? (Cock is his word.
Polite brothels are my style.)
Frank launches into
his long dream
to be Geri's pimp.
That's a wet dream,
I laugh. Sure, he says,
but she's real, she's not a dream.
And I: Does she know
what you say about her
behind her back?
Frank: Sure, she loves me.
He wants to buy me a beer.
No, this's my only job.
Breathing booze gets you fired
if you push your luck.
Frank pulls up green grass.
All his life he's wanted to pimp.
Geri's a good girl, he says,
she'll do anything I want,
and adds: You'd get off too,
her skin is alabaster white.
Naturally our conversation
shifts to Manson.
Guy filing his claim today
needed to talk about love
and death, Sharon Tate
and the lifestyle of the rich
confronting the poor pimp
with his bevy of girls
holing up at the Spahn Ranch
in Death Valley.
Guy said, Charlie's girls killed
for him, murder earned them
like an eagle-scout badge.
He's got his boys selling
dope on the streets of L.A.,
up and down the canyons.
And on all of San Francisco's
Roman hills, those St. Francis
named before he left town
to rid Ireland of its snakes.
That was St. Patrick, I said.
Guy: Oh . . . So how much
do I get a week? I think,
That's like Frank
asking me what I thought
his wife was worth
on the meat market.
Me: She's your wife, Frank.
He replies, I want her to work
on her back for me
so I can keep control.
Better than eight to five,
he swears, doing hairdos,
painting nails. Hell,
floycealexander (he says
my name fast, like I ask),
she's a good piece,
she needs to sell it.
It's up to you and her, I say.
I go back to the claims window,
and here's this lady with tits . . .
(19-20 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
or to the left . . .
the direction the car
is traveling the back road
to or from the dam
the salmon run, hurdling
the falls to reach the calm
spawning waters
if first the Yakama don't spear
them climbing the ladder.
Buena is where
the Guzmans live.
Frank talks while I take
an hour to eat my lunch
on the grass
outside Employment Security
in Toppenish. Frank's wife
Geri takes classes
with Cathleen in Yakima,
at The Beauty School.
Frank knows I live here
alone, where Cathleen was
better-looking than the others.
You need a wife, she said,
I've got a wild hair up my cunt
I need to tame.
Frank asks what I do for pussy.
You mean, Where does my
Little Man go? (Cock is his word.
Polite brothels are my style.)
Frank launches into
his long dream
to be Geri's pimp.
That's a wet dream,
I laugh. Sure, he says,
but she's real, she's not a dream.
And I: Does she know
what you say about her
behind her back?
Frank: Sure, she loves me.
He wants to buy me a beer.
No, this's my only job.
Breathing booze gets you fired
if you push your luck.
Frank pulls up green grass.
All his life he's wanted to pimp.
Geri's a good girl, he says,
she'll do anything I want,
and adds: You'd get off too,
her skin is alabaster white.
Naturally our conversation
shifts to Manson.
Guy filing his claim today
needed to talk about love
and death, Sharon Tate
and the lifestyle of the rich
confronting the poor pimp
with his bevy of girls
holing up at the Spahn Ranch
in Death Valley.
Guy said, Charlie's girls killed
for him, murder earned them
like an eagle-scout badge.
He's got his boys selling
dope on the streets of L.A.,
up and down the canyons.
And on all of San Francisco's
Roman hills, those St. Francis
named before he left town
to rid Ireland of its snakes.
That was St. Patrick, I said.
Guy: Oh . . . So how much
do I get a week? I think,
That's like Frank
asking me what I thought
his wife was worth
on the meat market.
Me: She's your wife, Frank.
He replies, I want her to work
on her back for me
so I can keep control.
Better than eight to five,
he swears, doing hairdos,
painting nails. Hell,
floycealexander (he says
my name fast, like I ask),
she's a good piece,
she needs to sell it.
It's up to you and her, I say.
I go back to the claims window,
and here's this lady with tits . . .
(19-20 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Sunday, August 17, 2014
South of Here
We came in together, the men looked up, the one with red hair, in particular. He asked, What y'all want with us?
I glanced at Precious, who cocked an eyebrow. She does the other one, I thought, and we're in the soup.
We took a seat at the counter, near the door. No one came to wait on us. Red said it again. I looked at Precious, her eyes on fire with the sun sliding under the door. I said to Red, I'm gay, hombre, can't you tell?
Why else would I be looking at a handsome dude like you? and muttered to Precious: Cracker. She smiled with both eyes and quickly I led her out to the car. I saw Red get up and start toward the door, but the window turned into a door. He and his buddies were coming through the door as I was shifting the Healey into third and then fourth when the tachometer said I should. We flew down that two-lane Alabama highway like passenger pigeons not only out of season but far from home now they were extinct.
Why'd you say that to him? she asked.
Seem'd like the best answer to his question.
That elicited one of her trademark chuckles that never failed to remind me of her half century of Southern speech . . . brogue . . . the word I learned from my kinfolk. Also long ago . . .
But you don't fight . . .
No . . . the hands, honey, I can't afford to bust my hands up.
She didn't know me well, but that was good enough, she didn't go on to ask what she must have wondered: Look at this big guy with his Cherokee eyes, why wouldn't the Irish and the Welsh and the Scots in him throw down? And I knew she'd never care now that we were out of there and happy, even with the top up and the rain beginning to pour down, fogging the windows so much I had to pull off on a muddy road, find a place to park out of sight, reach over and pull her to me, and every reader, North, South, East, and West, knows what happened next. It's nobody's business, Billie was singing on the radio . . . It's nobody's business if I do . . .
(17 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
I glanced at Precious, who cocked an eyebrow. She does the other one, I thought, and we're in the soup.
We took a seat at the counter, near the door. No one came to wait on us. Red said it again. I looked at Precious, her eyes on fire with the sun sliding under the door. I said to Red, I'm gay, hombre, can't you tell?
Why else would I be looking at a handsome dude like you? and muttered to Precious: Cracker. She smiled with both eyes and quickly I led her out to the car. I saw Red get up and start toward the door, but the window turned into a door. He and his buddies were coming through the door as I was shifting the Healey into third and then fourth when the tachometer said I should. We flew down that two-lane Alabama highway like passenger pigeons not only out of season but far from home now they were extinct.
Why'd you say that to him? she asked.
Seem'd like the best answer to his question.
That elicited one of her trademark chuckles that never failed to remind me of her half century of Southern speech . . . brogue . . . the word I learned from my kinfolk. Also long ago . . .
But you don't fight . . .
No . . . the hands, honey, I can't afford to bust my hands up.
She didn't know me well, but that was good enough, she didn't go on to ask what she must have wondered: Look at this big guy with his Cherokee eyes, why wouldn't the Irish and the Welsh and the Scots in him throw down? And I knew she'd never care now that we were out of there and happy, even with the top up and the rain beginning to pour down, fogging the windows so much I had to pull off on a muddy road, find a place to park out of sight, reach over and pull her to me, and every reader, North, South, East, and West, knows what happened next. It's nobody's business, Billie was singing on the radio . . . It's nobody's business if I do . . .
(17 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Friday, August 15, 2014
Last Days in San Angel
"A postmodern iconoclast who believed in the discipline of the classics."
Jeanette Winterson
When she learned she would soon die,
she took a plane to Mexico City.
She would write the rest of her novel
in San Angel, near La Casa Azul.
She had learned to put up with addicts,
malcontents, and cops, untrustworthy
like me, said she. Here she could stay
out of range of the cartel wars.
She wrote of the twenty-first century
speeding backward to 600 A.D.,
starting in Manhattan, her home,
ending in Mecca, the planet dying.
She drank after working and liked
to fuck the neighbor boys who had
the time when she found them in.
Fucking she never got enough of.
This was her novel of shame and gore.
The religious wars. Blood and money
when neither would matter anymore.
She thought to call it "Cross of Bone."
To end with, she gave up needles
and reefers, sipped El Pacifico,
pulque when she needed the jolt.
She hung around the carnaval
across the grass and in the cantina
until the taberna opened its doors.
She called all her friends at home;
those never there she gave up on.
Amassing a phenomenal phone bill
when lucky enough to get through,
she listened more than talked, proud
of keeping out the words of death.
Her book would prophesy the clocks
stopping to begin the red rivers
flowing. She climbed into bed naked,
her ink slowing to its crimson shade.
(13-16 August 2014)
copyright by Floyce Alexander
Jeanette Winterson
When she learned she would soon die,
she took a plane to Mexico City.
She would write the rest of her novel
in San Angel, near La Casa Azul.
She had learned to put up with addicts,
malcontents, and cops, untrustworthy
like me, said she. Here she could stay
out of range of the cartel wars.
She wrote of the twenty-first century
speeding backward to 600 A.D.,
starting in Manhattan, her home,
ending in Mecca, the planet dying.
She drank after working and liked
to fuck the neighbor boys who had
the time when she found them in.
Fucking she never got enough of.
This was her novel of shame and gore.
The religious wars. Blood and money
when neither would matter anymore.
She thought to call it "Cross of Bone."
To end with, she gave up needles
and reefers, sipped El Pacifico,
pulque when she needed the jolt.
She hung around the carnaval
across the grass and in the cantina
until the taberna opened its doors.
She called all her friends at home;
those never there she gave up on.
Amassing a phenomenal phone bill
when lucky enough to get through,
she listened more than talked, proud
of keeping out the words of death.
Her book would prophesy the clocks
stopping to begin the red rivers
flowing. She climbed into bed naked,
her ink slowing to its crimson shade.
(13-16 August 2014)
copyright by Floyce Alexander
Meteorology
Butler drove down alone to see her--what was it, 23 mile, 25 . . . ?
Bought her what she wanted, little enough. But not what
he had. I swear, the other couple happy, between us.
Took all night, most of the next sun. Then back to a state of ire
unlike the night before's, sky clustered with milkweed,
birds roosting in trees, nests repaired before they flew.
She felt better--who wouldn't? Having denied nature its human due
years and days and hours, sleeping alone, no man was sane--
and why not? Lives ruptured, all she wanted was happiness
in all this rain--these tears--lately fallen behind a curtain of space,
wept in dust now mud. Who didn't know there were many cosmos
clouds don't reach? cousins of stars, shirt-tailed comets,
the family tree tragically felled before roots had plunged
deep, to drink. Memory looms before he goes away.
(15 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Bought her what she wanted, little enough. But not what
he had. I swear, the other couple happy, between us.
Took all night, most of the next sun. Then back to a state of ire
unlike the night before's, sky clustered with milkweed,
birds roosting in trees, nests repaired before they flew.
She felt better--who wouldn't? Having denied nature its human due
years and days and hours, sleeping alone, no man was sane--
and why not? Lives ruptured, all she wanted was happiness
in all this rain--these tears--lately fallen behind a curtain of space,
wept in dust now mud. Who didn't know there were many cosmos
clouds don't reach? cousins of stars, shirt-tailed comets,
the family tree tragically felled before roots had plunged
deep, to drink. Memory looms before he goes away.
(15 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Wednesday, August 13, 2014
Peaceful Valley
Before
I was over there
one night, his place
wired for sound
. . . Lockjaw on sax,
who with I don't know,
Lonnie's teaching me jazz
and right now I'm out
of crystal meth,
veins hungering to
slow down and sleep.
Peaceful Valley is named
for a war yet to come.
Lonnie says he needs
money but pussy's okay.
That's how I got pregnant.
I'm too young for a baby.
In a canyon of L.A.
the abortion happens,
then I'm happy,
then sad, then forget.
After
I love her,
ask her to marry,
it's been a week,
I can't look far
from her eyes.
Time contracts,
love overflows.
I love my luck,
I love her
for her gift.
She wants me home,
wants life like it was:
coming home for lunch,
to bed for dessert,
our flood of happiness
contagious. I back out
to East Webb. At the door
she hikes her dress,
shimmers with joy.
I still taste her flower.
(12-13 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
I was over there
one night, his place
wired for sound
. . . Lockjaw on sax,
who with I don't know,
Lonnie's teaching me jazz
and right now I'm out
of crystal meth,
veins hungering to
slow down and sleep.
Peaceful Valley is named
for a war yet to come.
Lonnie says he needs
money but pussy's okay.
That's how I got pregnant.
I'm too young for a baby.
In a canyon of L.A.
the abortion happens,
then I'm happy,
then sad, then forget.
After
I love her,
ask her to marry,
it's been a week,
I can't look far
from her eyes.
Time contracts,
love overflows.
I love my luck,
I love her
for her gift.
She wants me home,
wants life like it was:
coming home for lunch,
to bed for dessert,
our flood of happiness
contagious. I back out
to East Webb. At the door
she hikes her dress,
shimmers with joy.
I still taste her flower.
(12-13 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Monday, August 11, 2014
Her Lightning Cracks His Thunder
Of nothing we made this, our trembling.
Don't hide the fear, already shared.
Nausea, nausea, give us respite,
bring bread with a rack of chiles,
black and Spanish olives, and water
once the sea salt is boiled, tested, gone.
If there is hope, may it remain precious.
Let stars fall, holes open become black,
moon be trampled, sun yield to cold,
another day to follow; nights, bodies
and you riding me as far as the mountain:
Hymn of the body--Flee like a bird
to the mountain; dancing near the peak.
(5-6, 11 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
Don't hide the fear, already shared.
Nausea, nausea, give us respite,
bring bread with a rack of chiles,
black and Spanish olives, and water
once the sea salt is boiled, tested, gone.
If there is hope, may it remain precious.
Let stars fall, holes open become black,
moon be trampled, sun yield to cold,
another day to follow; nights, bodies
and you riding me as far as the mountain:
Hymn of the body--Flee like a bird
to the mountain; dancing near the peak.
(5-6, 11 August 2014)
copyright 2014 by Floyce Alexander
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