Poetry by Kenny Klein

[Dept of PMM Castle Life]

LOVE LETTER TO NEW YORK FROM A BAR IN LOS ANGELES


November rain on the Hollywood pavement
Tattoos an erratic beat
The rain clouds are one more transient pissing their
Dreams onto these languid streets
Movies, groovies, girls with fake boobies, faux
Diamonds, rhinestones and pearls
Dreaming of fame under glamorous names like
Minnie and Ruby and Merle
I'm just taking a stroll where the tourists all go
Down Hollywood, east to Cahuenga
Past the postcards and shoes and star maps and booze all
For sale in dreary November
There's a whiskey bar with the door ajar down the
Block from the walk of stars
Some crooner's tune about the ol' Dixie moon is
Drowned out by the passing of cars
It's a jumbled din when I first walk in of
Starlets and harlots and sages
Rockabilly mamas lean from their stools like
Tattooed Betty Pages, like Norma Jeans and beauty queens
Western shirts bracing their titties
Telling some codger their hard luck tales
Trading scotch whiskey for pity
The girl closest by has a gleam in her eye
Like a memory of New York in fall
Betty in blue, she dangles one shoe as she
Bares her intangible soul
With a body as long as the landscape along
Route 66 through Missouri
She gives me a twinge, as my lips meet the gin,
Memories flashing before me...
The din of the traffic on Saint Marks and First
Outside of that dingy cafe
In the instant that happiness slipped through my grip like
An off duty cab down broadway
The gin can remember New York that November
The first bitter tingle of Fall
And an urchin who aced about two dozen faces
Damn if I don't remember them all
Her skin white as mist, thighs barely glimpsed in that
Space where her skirt met her hose
Her tresses held mystery like no one in history'd
Ever invented a comb
We were stick figures posing in passion and clothing from
Trash And Vaudeville
S & M tethers and all that black leather, shit,
Sometimes I dress like that still
When the rain beats just so and I don't really know if it's
Here or New York or L.A.
A lifetime unwinds one thought at a time like it's
Eating your memory away
Love and disdain and the bar and the rain and the
Places that I'd rather be
And being a miss, Betty, riddle me this, do you
Think she'd be thinking of me?
Just how can you know as the blind hours go
Disappearing like nickels and dimes
That a smile and a peck are the last ones you'll get, that
"So long" must suffice for "goodbye"?
And the rest of the joke wasn't funny, it was
Just the set-up that kept you amused
One punch line or another, they just make you shudder
No matter how wisely you choose....
In L.A. it's still pissing like angels are missing
With snide grins the heavenly pot
Betty leans on her chair with her ass in the air and this
Gin's just not hitting the spot
The dreams you dream here are like Saint Louis beer
You don't buy it, bud, you just rent it
In the Angeles dawn I'm just standing alone on
The corner of Shit and Cahuenga
So good night Kate, I just made a date with a
Bottle of V.S.O.P.
Back home where the Bettys are a meaningless memory
Just the rain, New York City and me

 

BLACK WIDOW

There's something to be said for a lady in black
With long purple tresses running down her back
A little black casket with a cross by her side
And an arrogant shuffle in her walk, in her stride
Her lips are pursed where her fake fangs lay
She wields her purse in a defiant way
She's got a silk lace blouse and a spider web skirt
What they cover can only be described as pert

Oh Black Widow, oh gothette chick
One bite away from a blood lust lick
What can I give you that no one else could?
Your relationships suck but you look real good
Your life is devoted to erotic gore and I'm
Knock-knock-knocking on your coffin door
I'm dressing like Danzig, I'm talking like a freak
Your erotic psychotic D and S touch I seek
I've read every book in Anne Rice's trilogy
About Sleeping Beauty so you'll notice me

I've been dreaming of that one drop of blood that lies
On pale white skin as I worship at your thighs
Give me your cynicism, give me your trust,
Give me that click of your tongue in disgust

Oh Black Widow, oh gothette chick
Your cafe rantings are deliciously sick
Pour me a coffee so tart and so black
And describe your phantasms till I cum or I yack
Your look is Edward Gorey, your voice is Monroe
Your underwear reminds me of that midnight picture show
Your shoes are Puritan, your hair is blue
And I'll need intensive therapy for loving you

Oh Black Widow, oh gothette girl
Let me taste devotion at the mother of your pearl
Let me revel in the doomscape of your poetic mind
Let me worship Lillith and all of demon kind
Kiss me, bite me, tie me to your bed
Give me damiana for the throbbing in my head
Tell me that you love me as you shuffle out the door, and
leave me pathetically wanting more

 

DELICATE

I'm not certain

Delicate is the

Right word to use

you understand,

Because Delicate evokes images

Of honeysuckle flowers

Sweet as bee's drink

In passionate summer.

Long fingers embracing the trellis

And holding like a lover

In the tears of ecstasy. Delicate

Yes, but with mysterious Autumn

Flowers whither on choking stalks

A rose perhaps

Delicate filigree of fingers

Woven on each petal

Each petal floating languid on

Still lake water

It's bloom forever recalled

In the memory of a game of

Love-me, love-me-not.

Your soft red hair in

Each fate drenched blossom

That will flow to the sea

And drink forever of

Sweet salt, like tears.

Understand that I've dreamt,

Long Spring days, of

Your Delicate lips

forming words like spider webs that

Fall into the flower print of

Your billowing skirt,

Until wind comes and

Blows spider webs away.

And the tender work of

Knitting each Delicate strand must begin

As it has always begun,

With cunning as

Soft as red hair.

But no,

I realize that

the Delicate flower of your beauty---

Your pale skin,

Vine long legs,

Red hair like rose sap

Eyes held in

Languid embrace,

The rose petals falling on

Flower print skirt

Your fingers twist lazily

Around honeysuckle stems---

Is the fragile

Delicate spring

Of a mouse trap

Set so tenderly within

The honeysuckle's withering flower.

 

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