Kelle Groom

 

Granada

High in a window of the Alhambra, mosaic blouse,
Mott the Hoople hair, I drifted against the wall of blue
and fell all night, at home. I lived unknown on the coast,

in a military school, singing Dan Fogelberg, not mixing—
the hierarchy repellant. On arriving I'd spoken to a girl
who wore socks of different colors, was warned I'd be

aligned with her, like trolls and elves. Then, at a family
picnic on the base, a blond sailor asked me out, and for
weeks, we drank sangria bumpy with fruit in a patio bar,

rum and cokes in the disco with my name, dark shots
in the stand-up with locals by the ocean, the conversation
like an old manuscript, illuminated but incomprehensible—

we'd spin on the sand, feet to the water, I'd come home
swirling from the maritime, adorned, so that my parents
began to suspect my dates included alcohol or sex, and told

me the truth, that the boy had only been conscripted, asked
by my father at the picnic to take his daughter out.
We were in the Pontiac, driving by the drive-in movie screen

empty and bleak, my thin sheen of self-esteem razed, I'd been
hoping for love, someone living, but it was the castle
air that held me above that red roofed cookie town.

 

Take this Longing from My Tongue

Two pages of Caedmon's Song
translated on yellow legal pages,
white sheets, two white pillows,
(my blood permanent on one),

the scratchy polyester bedspread
with a big pin at the bottom,
the Green Goddess of the Eight Great
Obstructions, farmers from Peru

on a blanket nailed to the wall,
yellow oil that heats skin like hot
cinnamon candy, Red Hots burning
on your tongue, seven guitars--

it could still be freezing,
sharp folds of robe
dividing his panes of light.

 

Odeon in Noho

There's a beehive in the stars, & a coiled
Party beehive wig with yarny, yellow bees
On the head of the beautiful girl who slipped
Newspaper into the soles of her burned out
Shoes. Janean wore a plastic dome sewed
To the front of her shirt, like a stomach-sized version
Of a Trouble game, put a baby doll inside.
When the Greeks couldn't see the beehive
In the sky, there'd be rain & storms--the wind up,
Blowing lightning in a cloud across the bright lake.

 

The Holy Dark was Moving Too

The heat has gone to my head,
sun silt tapping,

a girl's sweater
whitening, porch

flames spinning
blue flight--

put on the dark
belt along the water edge,
the trick is a fast burning solution--
grain alcohol burns itself up

before it has a chance to burn you
and there are no reflections
no objects to take hold of with your eye.