| DRINKING FRENCH CHARDONNAY 1. I sniff the waist of these French grapes. I taste their skin of green quartz. But never in my wildest dreams would I expect to find a French chardonnay engaged in such lusty tango. Now that you are no more, Maria, I shall blend a handful of this bandoneon voice that still scorches our throats, with a little bit of mine. Horacio Ferrer enjoyed the slender waist of lusty chardonnay as much as I do, but preferred, I believe, the ultimate distraction of a mature cabernet, often in the nude, loitering hallways, watering red houseplants. Which doesn’t atone for the liberties transgressed by this vivacious French wine. Horacio Ferrer and I share a glass of this chardonnay. Simple words merely disguise the chardonnay’s bruised hips. Still, there’s a courage, here, you don’t often find in white wine. 2. La mariposa. Yellow rings on black ashes. Mariposa rocks a cradle that resembles a split-pea pod. Mariposa follows the bandoneon into alleys, exchanges lipstick with death. Mariposa. My solitude wilts before your impulsive nature. Mariposa. You deliver families missing a few teeth, eyes reflecting crude oil. You deliver dreams in the form of overpriced movie seats, I know you! You are the last creature to invade my solitary mansion. Your sanctioned coins, with holes in their heads, stumbled over cliffs like buffalo fleeing Blackfoot myths, falling victim to shaman dementia. Carl Jung was close to Native Americans, although their relationship was never consummated. A Navajo boy spots a hunting party far from its Chiricahua camp. The boy’s elders quickly deconstruct alliances with Mangas Coloradas. Crops are planted. 3. This pale French fruit splashes golden hips against her crystal waist. At Chiparelli’s restaurant, nestled between the glistening black alleys of Little Italy, Baltimore. 4. Our bouvier, Chloe, follows the bandoneon through an unlocked gate. Discovers frozen blue lamplight is nothing more than a simple illusion. The same old illusion so often endured behind her split-rail universe. The moon appears to be missing one eye as she lunges forward, hair of smoke. The universe appears to be missing a purpose. 5. Maria stands squarely in the way of modern progress. Rich men attempt to buy her off. Poor men pretend to be her confidant. Older men display erudition as though it were their final trump. 6. Our first love affairs always collapse somewhere between the abyss of intellect and emotion. They must; otherwise, they would exist merely as giant otters in a river too cold for human habitation. But first love defies prediction. You can’t anticipate its impact. First love is perhaps the most mythologized love of all time. It commands its own space in the love hall of fame. It changes DNA forever. ©Alan Britt 2007 |
| THREE-LAYERED POEM Green ink stains imagination. In their gated communities, residents in zebra camouflage, like zombies unable to escape their chosen fates, ram their SUV’s through steel-reinforced front gates. An old dancer rises in a Juárez tavern, scrapes her heel twice against the wavy wooden planks of the tavern floor then slowly resurrects young men, clouds of young men, plus some middle-aged geezers, from the peaceful sunlit dust of her Juárez tavern. ©Alan Britt 2007 |
| BIRDS OF THE UNIVERSE CONGREGATE IN REISTERSTOWN Chirps and whistles wear straw hats made in Bogotá. The orange cardinal’s loop inside a bright green maple is a political statement pertaining to the Middle East or Central America, whichever culture is most vulnerable at any given moment. Finches nest for the next three-hundred years in an industry-woven shadow-eaten machinegun-beaten straw hat. ©Alan Britt 2007 |