By: David Francis

The Limits of Metaphor

People get off the bus
that’s lit up like an ocean liner
in front of the neon burglar-barred
food store-tattoo-modeling studio
and they disperse in all directions
they might be going to apartments
or places of business
open on a Saturday night
or they might even be changing
to another bus
which is one thing they probably
wouldn’t be doing on an ocean liner

###

University Statue

You will never see
a statue
do the breaststroke
or the dog paddle
in a fountain.

###

Polluto-Politics

The pollution is getting so bad
in the hometown where I was a lad
that a breath of fresh air
simply reeks of despair
unless you’re an industrialist cad.

###

Plastic Fruit

Glaucous surface of black grapes—
the most convincing of the lot.
The banana, pears, orange, and apples
are false-colored, and the basket
looks like Bathsheba’s crown
In a Sunday school pageant.

Next to them is a glass-petaled platter
with a plastic-brown container,
sized in between a pencil holder and a large mug,
holding an eggbeater, two wooden spoons,
and a batter whipper of vanilla hue.
Something else sticks out and is blue.

The display case is about as long
as a casket, a magic one cut in half.
I have described one half. The other
showcases four instances of floral
elegance: off-white, mauve, peach in little
nests; lime in a mug of heart-rows.

Like amateur poetry montaged onto
posters of Op Art are these hearts.
The siren charm of nostalgia—
a lotus flashback: whoever arranged
this must have been blind.
As a child I tried to eat this fruit!

###

Existence

The one-winged bug
marching across the blue bedspread
to the land of plaid.