By: Steven Fortune

POST-ROTARY LULLABYE

Silly but innocuous
maybe even obvious of me
to tell her blue
was my choice
colour of cat
(Those overcast days
of moist sidewalks
and teal sky saliva
vivify the whimsy in me)
It made her laugh
and I was happy to be known
then vindicated
when a ray of margarine yellow
on apparent cue
punctured the meringue above
cupped an eyeball of mine
like a fish hook
and prodded my entire head
to register a house
sporting navy-royal rooftop
shingles on a road
we often travelled
in conclusion to
the Rotary traverse
It had to be a fresh roof
or at least
freshly relevant
to the compendium
of our eclectic verbal scores
played out on this route
Whatever the criteria
it nursed to health
my hitherto-comedic melancholy
over non-existent naturally
blue cats
Only a triumphant solidity
of blue above could pad
this slice of juvenilia
with further yeast
but I end it as I ended
the walk
happy that I made her laugh
and whole in the encompassing
of teal and yellow
in the elemental suburbs
of my grounding hub

###

HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MAN?

He is seasoned in turning
vendettas into trophies
like an old outbreak
respawned and impervious
to the patronization of relevance

Rummaging through a swollen
rolodex of dog-eared wings
there are always updates
and decisions to assess
for the wind is the voice
of an ally and the cloth
of an emperor’s conscience

The pacemaker of his clout
enables a pulse engineering
his imperative train through
the arteries suturing the ever-expanding
outposts of his aqueous elucidation

He is coming for amalgamation
He aspires to usurp the mainframe

Allegations shall rescind
into moot statues speckling
the zones in which he has acquired
and absorbed both sides

###

LINGO DROUGHTS
I.

Notify the pillars of the patriation
Apply the secret knock
to your underground interpreter’s door
We are older than before
We have shed the preface training wheels
and are coming for the polish
of your most climactic chapter’s respect

II.

No unveiling revelation cloned itself
in self-assuring day planner pages
nor did debonair winks of rhetoric
attain attention for the eyes
while our secret sign language
seared a path through the brush
sapped of moisture’s ink by youth
infused lingo droughts

III.

We are what an appetite looks like
Invisibility made visible
with the couture of the inevitable
reincarnating as the natty trends
your acronyms cannot keep up with

###

RECOVERED FROM A SIGHTLESS NIGHT

Hail to the riddle
self-rhapsodizing in its spice of rust
like a bearded young grandfather
Lest we forget
Fugitive pages from the tomb
of Ozymandias
tickle its sleep like the midnight knocks
of flaming prodigal sons
I can prolong a cup of coffee
over several hours on my deadest days
When you live in insecure words
arbitrary talents are your child’s teddy bear
or at least that’s what you tell yourself
fleeing late-night grease fires with the animal in tow
A riddle of this pedigree must be revered
and considered in an environmental shortage
It can outlive any language
patronize any code
so long as the question
doesn’t draw and the answer
doesn’t write