Glen Armstrong
Zorine, Queen of the Nudists #17
Stealing, fighting, listening
to music with the distinct goal
of becoming part of a scene . . .
some activities lend themselves
to protective clothing,
some its ritualized removal.
Riding a motorcycle, engaging
a lover whose needs were shaped
long ago by a shoe, a thin
leather belt, a silk promise made
through a keyhole where
a fragment... . There’s a world
out there that the bare
body rarely escapes.
Good Neighbor #9
I get through the morning as if threading a needle. It requires persistence and reading glasses. At noon the city tests their tornado alarms, and I still miss you.
The weather can change in a heartbeat, on a dime. Our metaphors tend toward blood and money.
I could take up gardening or read Moby Dick, let some other slow process take over. I could do the dishes or look for the attachments that would let me vacuum the blinds. At two o’clock the mail comes. At five I will find something from the freezer to heat up for dinner.
Basic French
Example: I like the blue dress.
Or: I spend the rest of the night
licking Suzanne.
I love being nineteen
years old and painting my lips.
Example: red.
Or: the color of young corn.
If one thinks, one tends
to exist,
but if one thinks deeply,
one tends
to lose oneself in thought.
Example: The blue belongs
to the dress.
Or: The night’s remainder
belongs to the night,
even as it melts
like butter on toast.
Suzanne’s blue dress
belongs to Suzanne even
when the two become separate.
Does the blue belong to Suzanne?
There is no single word
that covers the concept
of butter together
with toast.
If one involves one’s mouth,
one tends to think.
One’s head entertains
the first word that pops.
Example: eating.
Or: breakfast.
Or: corn.
Can I give my mouth to Suzanne?
Does one’s head entertain?
Example: internally.
Or: vocabulary.
I would rather make
than do.
Both are preferable
to making do,
merely getting by.
Suzanne is getting less
blue and getting more
the color of Suzanne
in a dimly lit room.
Example: the color of smoke.
Or: moonlight.
Does the color belong
to smoke or Suzanne?
And what of upon or in?
Example: inviting.
Or: begging.
The egg,
though far from perfectly round,
rolls from the counter
to the floor.
Or: smashing.
Try to imagine Suzanne
belonging to the vernacular.
Or: facing.
A person, place, or object.
Example: blue dress.
Or: That is a smashing
blue dress.
Have I seen it before?
The dress is of
the dresses.
The rest belongs to the night.
The rest is both
sleep and everything
that we haven’t yet covered.
Glen Armstrong holds an MFA in English from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst and teaches writing at Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan. He edits a poetry journal called Cruel Garters and has three current books of poems: Invisible Histories, The New Vaudeville, and Midsummer. His work has appeared in Poetry Northwest, Conduit, and Cream City Review.