Screen Dump 392

Off-days the string quartet in your back pocket
is all but played out . . . in three-quarter time . . .
Exes . . . marking the spot . . . steal second . . .  and more . . .
transposing the theme of Lassie, chock-full of unclaimed funds . . .
sitting there . . . festering? . . .
in the lap of jargon . . .
with no one worth emailing
about the sinister drop . . . in temperature . . .
A pound of something . . .
Tragedians backed-up at the roundabout
conjure audience implants
with places to go . . . people to be . . .
reworking the boundaries of ancient-Greek mythos
with aspiring telecommuters . . .
I brood Bacon's comment about the violence of paint . . .
What better way? . . .
Did you think you had thought of everything? . . .

Cesar Ordoñez

Screen Dump 391

You've hit an orchestrated snag . . .
The ancient phobia reappearing with Leopardi's Hodge-Podge . . .
Evidently the time was set . . . and now, the retracing . . .
as in La Familia de Celilia . . .
accompanied by what if a much of a which of a wind . . .
Here's the windup . . . and the pitch (as black as) . . .
sending it out of the park and into the maelstrom of great silence . . .
with hey, diddle, diddle, / the cat and the fiddle . . .
with the cats . . . and the fiddles . . . at 10 AM on August 12, 1958 . . .
Art Kane for Esquire . . .
Not inclined to venture out into the drifting
Silent Snow, Secret Snow . . . above all . . . a secret . . .
Thinking - metaphorically - how disturbed one must be to do that, yes? . . .
But let's not go there . . . Who (in fact) killed Cock Robin? . . .
Circa 1950s . . . the black and white Stromberg Carlson
and the opening scene of Robin's arrow speeding into a tree . . .

Art Kane's, A Great Day in Harlem, 1958

Screen Dump 390

A yellow submarine's sonar . . . pings . . .
somewhere . . . with directions to what? . . . last minute specials? . . .
The oddments are such that we could enjoy the respite
but this too is back-burnered
along with notes from Illuminations . . .
Sine waves sign in . . . trigger dance fever . . .
filling the silence with names . . . faces . . .
photomontages of parties . . . of the first . . . and second part
emailing jpgs to lovers . . . and other strangers . . .
Keep the words coming, he/she said . . .
strolling among the pines . . . on a winter afternoon . . .
worrying fonts . . . as if the image . . . you and I know this . . .

Dorith Mous

Screen Dump 389

Choosing tautology to express emptiness
your erotic other's tacit acceptance
waits in the wings . . . primping . . . with extras
Uber'd in for the shoot
for MoMA's History of Hooking . . .
a trailer on the set of Boardwalk Empire . . .
dioramas, day trips, drive-bys, past priors . . .
You examine the separation
that informed your odyssey . . .
an escapist's myopia . . . scheduled to air
on subsequent Tuesdays in February . . . or March . . .
with one-night stands costumed as dreams
of uncooperative dentists retrofitted
for the unbeaten hometown debating team
from your up close and personal
when you were stuck in traffic for over a year . . .

Charlotte Strode

Screen Dump 388

What is it that I love in loving you?
          - St. Augustine, Confessions

An 18-wheeler's list of gritty demands rear-ends your odyssey
as underperformers face the dilemma of Cup or Core . . .
Eyeshadowed eyes follow in the afterglow of first-come first-serveds . . .
Omissions make worthwhile the feel-good . . .
as it gushes . . . strangely satisfying . . .
with only-child enthusiasm . . .
Buried beneath the paper trail are instructions for the real . . .
which you repress for later parsing
by the I'll-see-your-twenty-and-raise-you-twenty
grammarians emeriti
who talk more . . . but settle for less . . . 50 minutes later . . .

Paolo Roversi

Screen Dump 387

But what about de-composing . . . a poem, for example,
as if from across the room the mirror images of yes and no? . . .
You think infinite . . . bundled with song as a way out . . . as an escape route . . .
the narrative color-coded for easy access . . . the point of view . . .
again, an empty room . . . filling with strangers . . .
The neighborhood unwilling to disgorge a parking space
though in such moments one sometimes stumbles upon an area of respite . . .
a wilted exemplar of geologic time . . .
Elsewhere . . . the obvious . . . or not so . . .
to make it sound as if it had just been thought up . . .

Ellen von Unwerth

Screen Dump 386

By that I mean treading water . . .
You know, to tread water . . . as praxis . . .
But then, he/she was disheveled . . .
jaywalking . . . and . . .
moments later . . . entered a CVS . . .
as if subscribing to the notion
that everything can be tabled . . .
should be tabled . . .
Equations . . . and what have you . . .
The passivity will eventually get to you
but I feel a kind of obligation . . .
a sense of commitment . . . notwithstanding . . .
Why did you stick that in? . . .
No idea . . . perhaps equivalence . . .
the awareness of defiance . . .
A tad heavy handed, yes? . . .
I've lost the sense of comma-placement . . .

Irma Haselberger

Screen Dump 385

You appeared unruffled at the dress rehearsal
running the gauntlet of valets wielding remotes . . .
I found it hard to believe that replacements were forbidden . . .
The whole thing was chancy, but exciting, yes? . . .
You made a go for it but ended up staring
at snowflakes through the window of his/her bedroom
filled with rococo . . . which I must say says it all . . .
The elegant attentions were, at least for the moment,
a recognition of deferral despite the extended warranty . . .
You did opt for that, didn't you? . . .

Your naiveté cranked to eleven you declaimed

that you had inherited the silliness

from the French avant-garde . . . which you had been
introduced to by a substitute teacher in second grade
whose name was among those listed somewhere . . .

Irma Haselberger