brian mcdonald
Brian McDonald lives and works in Cleveland, Ohio. He
was born in 1972. Since 1972 he has been involved in/with
poetry, politics, pizza delivery, po-boy stardom, picadillo purloinery,
push-ups, push-overs, palmetto stillettoes and practical pomposity,
among other things. His poems have appeared on various
pages and walls in permanent and type-written ink. He is
trying to write in plain language that which is strange. bamcdonald27@hotmail.com
Wide Lakes A
It is better
This time
For the two of us to look
Out at things growing,
And only when things grow.
And obvious things too,
Like the green, green, green-gray
Water.
How
It ought to sire another
Just like itself, only farther
Away.
It is better for us
This time,
After running and crashing,
To settle down.
Let the sweat drip off our
Faces,
Let the skin dry,
And let that
Bastard Death
Finally in.
It is better
This time
For these words to drift
Away like herds
Of children, to
Melt into the lake,
Where the waves can
Take them
And churn them
Into soldiers
And mosquitoes
Or fingers and
Broken anchors
Or whatever
It's doing
These days.
It is better for us
This time.
It will be better this time,
For us.
For us the times will
Be better.
Wide Lakes B
Busted in the mouth
Once and fell over
Right there like a foolish
Midwesterner
Gone to seed too early to really
Ever clamber out of
The bottom of whatever
Bottle he'd most recently
Drained.
Dumped in the magazine section of some out-of-
Town newsstand
Confused but still smart
Enough to know it's too
Cold to be warm
What the hell is this some
Rusty undergarment locked
Like a great wing across
This empty, so empty,
The streets of this town. This
City sitting and
Waiting for its blood to
Return.
Oh, howl for those moonlit evenings
Jellied across your memory
Oh, make sterile jokes swinging organs
And tambourine
Clamor.
Oh, shoot up underneath your foul leather
Coats and emotions from freezing plains
Like purple pills taken in unison
Under storm drains and
Copper illusions.
This is not the end. This is not the be
Ginning, neither ever really defined
Only vaguely introducing
Themselves at the back
Of the line
Throbbing
Like two smart ass dangerous brothers
With pockets full
And memories fading fast.
Wide Lakes C
I forget where I am going
Just as I open the door
And run aground
On the gazes
And shoulder creases
Of the party.
These ceilings are high.
These walls are orange.
Smoke trails
Over everyone's hair.
"Am I here?"
I ask the glass separating me
From a man standing
With a suitcase
At the top of the concrete landing.
He is set
To step out
Across the lawn,
Out onto the blacktop.
In leather
He is hidden.
He is putting up his umbrella
For it is raining
And he must depart.
Wide Lakes D
I roll up to the house in the evening
Wanting to talk to you
And my hair is dusty and my
Hands feel like chalk for the
Work I've been at
And I walked in here to talk
With you
Just now but you
Shouldn't have been so damned
Aggressive.
And I don't think you would've been if it
Weren't for your damned
Brother calling the shots.
Lord, he sits and watches those
Science fiction movies all day
Long and he wants to command.
So I ask you to come with me
For a drink at this bar
So we can have
Someplace to talk
And for a few minutes the red
Stools and the louder than hell
Baseball game
Tether us to sanity.
And I smoke a cigarette and
You drink your beer
And I tell you I want to buy you a great
New album that I read about
And you smile like it would be
The greatest thing and I say
That settles it and I put my
Hand on your back and you
Turn again to face the game.
And I go on to say that I'd love
To move like that, meaning like Omar
Across second base and
You just shrug. But what could
I expect from such an inarticulate
Way of saying I can't feel myself
Anymore.
But damn this air conditioning feels good
I say, and you agree that it's been
Too hot to breathe outside and
I say true that and take a sip of
Cold thin beer. I think that
I used to know better beer than
This, but the atmosphere
More than makes up for whatever
The beer lacks. I think
That I need another cigarette, and
Ask you for one. You reach in your
Pocket book, a little black thing,
Big enough only for
The wad of cash your brother
Gives you and that pack of cigarettes.
Thanks, I say and put my hand
On your back.
Palmetto
I left you with the surprise
Grocery bag upended inside
The entrance slippery from the sea
Water the children brought in with them.
Down there the sea salt in the
Air. Down there the sunset and
The dinner dates.
I broke my nose in a Frisbee
Game. I had bled everywhere.
My hair stood up and my face was
Sticky.
Down there the pine needles in the
Sand, the paralysis beach that stretched
My body to obesity.
I left with the crackpot Jonathan Edwards
And felt my legs give way.
We bought three robots and knocked
Over liquor stores in ski masks.
Down there the sea salt in the air,
The finest thing that surprised us all,
Was soft.
I surprised myself with a
Scarf present for Christmas.
Phone Call
Let me chase your alphabets
Under your skirt
The way you used to tickle so
Easy when it was hot.
Let me juice your feline
Cut-up, you're so funny
Sundays, throw away
Diaper dolls and friendly.
Let me hold your
Paunch under the burning lamp
Black and gaudy like a punch
Baby for you, lazy bones.
Let me sew ripe gutter hacks
Down your canyon for
The next person or
Savior of heightened rewind.
Let me suddenly appear on the
Carpet, like a follicle river of
Paint spilled for the gray
And silver patrolman's gigantus
Finger in the dial-tone position.
It's not the easiest thing, to starve
For the sweat, a fifth of the moment
All of the time.
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