Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Michael Cluff- Three Poems

Adam Everson

Lived under a boardwalk
or several at a time
between 23 and 25
until every one
corroded into the black heavy sea.
The sand was now a lack
of nutrients and allusions
to precivilized times.
At 28
he had underdone Kafka
became a student of tofu
wrote a book about
it all
and called the piece
an organic type
of philosophy
which
was as hamfisted
as any brown-washed bay
in late winter.
Now at 39,
he sells
herringbone sports coats
striped ties
mismatched underwear
and mastadon-weighed wingtips
at any of three desert outlets
ringing the ingresses into LA
while
working underfoot
to put palasides
near any viable ocean, lake
or mud-made reservoir.
Last week he drove a Porsche
until it became a Honda
of blue sorts.



Passage

From t-shirts and zoris
to paisley ties, vested suits and wingtips
the story of Max's life
is success in reverse.
The nice nuances of childhood
have been raped and shaved
into harsh trajectories of credit and cant.
The fiscal has tenderized the physical spark
of jollity he once displayed
in ring around the rosies
atop Huckleberry Hill
and bobbing for apples or pummelos
into jaundiced ennui,
pachyderming palaver,
amber-encasing emissions
of Pavlov jargon and socially accepted
jugular gargles and gulps.
He can't miss what he can't
now remember.



Untitled

Mr. Lambeau
teaches pre-school
in Sedco Hills
but works undercover
on the weekend
and holidays.

His services
amongst the maven set
is quite exhaustive.

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