POETRYGreat Poetsby Scott C. WellsWriter of the Month
our great poet
drowned in our great river
trying to make love
to the moon
our great poet
of the socialist state
shot himself for love
or was it stalin
our great poet
was gunned down
then repackaged
as t-shirts
our great poet
abjured his art
then left his wife
their second-best bed
our great poet
who might have died young
instead became
a not-so-great poet
our great poet
preferred in part
to lose her self
on brazilian shores
but chose instead
a death in winter
our great poet
or so they say, threw
herself from a cliff
to break with the waves
when only her words
no longer her self
inspired desire
take a page
from our great poet,
dressed in white
with paper and pen,
she wrote herself
away
Scott C. Wells is a professor of medieval history at California State University, Los Angeles. His academic writings have been published by Brill, Ashgate, Palgrave, and Cambridge University Press. His chapbook, Persons and Places, is available at Skylight Books in L.A.
with her balding bedsheets,
August’s bitch, strung up on the line
her feet are bleached roots
azalea eyes, blue from the acidic dirt of Panhandle drought
A whole town: armed to the teeth,
arming themselves against my teeth.
She-cat of Bladenboro,
I’m here for your dogs,
your sheep, your sons, your blood.
You know who I am, boys.
your candle burns too brightly
never to find another flame to stoke it:
your kindling is out there.
first of all, let’s talk sweet tea. Yankees joke about the secret being sugar—& it is, partly—but the real secret’s in the baking soda. it takes the bitterness out of the tea & makes the sweet taste sweeter. just like you should be to your husband. neutralize all the bitterness & just be sweet as Southern tea. & don’t squeeze them teabags. you know what I mean, girl.
and the old hatreds
have risen up from under their rocks
where they’ve been hiding
taking a new form
they ooze like stale bile
flowing out of sewers
i can feel your populism from here
in the cool confines of the passenger seat
your window is up too
we both got the a/c blasting, bro
because they sure make america hot these days
caliente or kalinatuh i’d say, much to your chagrin
everywhere i turn
the orange-faced bloviating billionaire
with bad hair and a small penis
tells me that he wants to make america great again
for its dying minority
in his d.c. office cum apartment
three miller lights into it
spit shinning his portrait of reagan for the third time
making the sign of the cross
a chunk of wisconsin cheese in his hand
after a hard day of obstructive legislative work
We caught her
100 Acres from the Woods
wearing white, a cotton dress
with porridge stains, raisins
and honey on her breath,
goose feathers almost disguised
by her long golden locks.
