Author: David Wright

BEZEL lets a glint of starlight fall on compass.
MEALY food awaits after his watch, and then
SLUNG deep in the airless hold, a bad night’s sleep.
FREER on land he muses, though once the sea seemed wild and free.

APPLE munching traveler gazes on passing lands,
TRAIN window could almost be a portal. The gothic
ABBEY, quickly passed, weaves its
SPELL: what if the tracks went back in time?

PERCH of hiding child in a tree, watching
FIEND set the house alight, fiend whom the neighborhood then
THREW a fete, and whom they struck a
MEDAL. Some villages celebrate their crimes.

SCOOP of sherbet first, then go repose,
RELAX, settle back in hammock.
LAYER on the good life! Smile a smile of
TEETH whiter than when you were born. Wealth! Looks! Leisure!

SMELT the snake in the cave more than saw,
VENOM? Wouldn’t know. Snake’s enough for fear.
SMALLness of me, one bite and they’ll find my bones here. A
CHECK on adventure: when real, the stakes are high.

BAWDY drunk singing bawdy songs traipsing past the camp.
SCOUTs don’t know: laugh or disapprove, so gaze into their
COCOA around the fire. The moment, now a funny
SPECK, will grow in telling, what the tramp sang ever fouler on recall.

TONAL midnight Poe poem:
RAVEN cawings, rustling winds, creaking hinges.
CURVE of moon a ghost ember in bleak December sky
DECAL this all on the brain for life’s supply of shuddering memory.

STUNG by thought that
THETA, strange word–is it really an English word?–worse than
PAPAL might make this poem impracticable.
VAUNT your inventive skills, yes, but some things won’t fly.

QUAIL in the bushes during
NAVEL orange fight.
FREER spirits shout and stamp and hurl fruit.
SPLATs announce solid hits, make bush lair seem wise.

WINCE is what he does when the
WOMEN, coming going, not so much Michaelangeloing,
SMOKY party air parting, give him merest glance:
BADLY assembled, badly turned out him