Kelley White- Three Poems

My mother says she doesn’t hate dogs,

just dog owners.

 

Donny walked up to us at the parade

with two little dogs strapped in a baby

carrier to his chest: wants to destroy

us with cuteness. He introduces them:

on his right, Elsa Schiaparelli, then

Giorgio Armani’s on the left. Coy

pup CoCo Chanel’s the little lady

with the pink bow taped to a little braid

on the top of her head in the stroller,

yap yap yapping little pink tongue lapping

my hands, can I get some soap please? I like

dogs but I hope these wear diapers. I might

like to wash my hands; give me a  napkin,

please, protect me from the Yorkshire terror.

 

 

 

The lack of an identifiable voice in White’s poems

 

might be considered a liability, though one is eventually

grateful that she does not stay with any of the annoying

personas she has foisted on her occasional readers, that is,

the members of her monthly poetry workshop. Once loyal

readers, in particular family members, are tired of her oft

strident and self-congratulatory word-play: “I hate the voice

she uses for Barbie” one young White relative was heard

to say, “and she never gets anything close to iambic

pentameter, she had absolutely two left feet when she tried

to get us to dance.” Though grateful to have relatively

rarely been topics of her writing, friends say they are sick

and tired of the hints at sexuality which sometimes push

into the foreground of her work. “And don’t even think about

punctuation,” cried: one of the co-workers, who, originally

pleased by her free copy promptly dumped it in the used

‘book’ bin--at the local Good Will.

 

 

 

RockStar

 

here is the poster

the other girl drew

before he knew you

 

it’s ugly even your

mother agrees it’s

 

obscene and wrong

yes, wrong, the crossed

 

out eyes, the mermaid

tail, the bunny ears

 

pink, no he wouldn’t

want a girl like that

to represent his art

 

now would he?