4 Poems by Nanette Rayman Rivera
I saw him
..........around the crook of the cape
thousands of Iceland Poppies, pistil
whipping, fizzing
the brewing water with bubbly calyx, some matrix
Ceremony for the ogler
..........No rain. ..Not even one plantain.
Toxic wind in the dunes.
Want hissing like his gnarled brown hands
petting tobacco leaves, better
wear your sundress buttoned up,
this guy will rustle you up like a cow.
This stranger better kept unkempt
on the wrong side of a pistol,
left to a rumpled county gunslinger itching for a brawl
who’d be the only one to murmur mutinous drifter
..........But here you are, tousled and impaled, sucking silence
and picturing some mink-eyes wet with downpour
hallucinating me.
..........around the crook of the cape
thousands of Iceland Poppies, pistil
whipping, fizzing
the brewing water with bubbly calyx, some matrix
Ceremony for the ogler
..........No rain. ..Not even one plantain.
Toxic wind in the dunes.
Want hissing like his gnarled brown hands
petting tobacco leaves, better
wear your sundress buttoned up,
this guy will rustle you up like a cow.
This stranger better kept unkempt
on the wrong side of a pistol,
left to a rumpled county gunslinger itching for a brawl
who’d be the only one to murmur mutinous drifter
..........But here you are, tousled and impaled, sucking silence
and picturing some mink-eyes wet with downpour
hallucinating me.
vinegar-girls-to-women won’t hire me
--later, in the street, the rain is waiting
in your laps. You’re the composers of burred sleepless decades
of days traipsing for work without a stiff handshake,
of pastures erased into earth without an Iris rainbow--
kitten-heels that’ve had it by the Copley Square lions.
Your hands are already protesters
knotting below sea level. Still full rasp-berry lips--
--much later, the stars are waiting.
I will wait you out. I won’t go
home, won’t get on the subway, not
at this hour, no, you can’t make me.
Otherwise almost summer--
compass roses orbiting don’t-walk signs, meeting secretly
in rain gutters. Today you complete another vicious
cycle tragically corkscrewing into libraries, cafes,
and the River Charles. The question of tragedy
as you question my face, beat me quickly,
leave through the third rail. You see, I make you
myth....I’ve forgotten you already--
The answer to beauty is truth. Still whitetail deer legs and eyes--
A bandage, bartenders and whiskey, two pretty men stacked
by the back door smoking. To be separated.
Off-stage, beauty blanketed, almost ruined, replicated
in the mirror, please wash your hands. Posted,
lovewords......healed fire ....men with jobs,
in their play I become normal.
--later, in the street, the rain is waiting
in your laps. You’re the composers of burred sleepless decades
of days traipsing for work without a stiff handshake,
of pastures erased into earth without an Iris rainbow--
kitten-heels that’ve had it by the Copley Square lions.
Your hands are already protesters
knotting below sea level. Still full rasp-berry lips--
--much later, the stars are waiting.
I will wait you out. I won’t go
home, won’t get on the subway, not
at this hour, no, you can’t make me.
Otherwise almost summer--
compass roses orbiting don’t-walk signs, meeting secretly
in rain gutters. Today you complete another vicious
cycle tragically corkscrewing into libraries, cafes,
and the River Charles. The question of tragedy
as you question my face, beat me quickly,
leave through the third rail. You see, I make you
myth....I’ve forgotten you already--
The answer to beauty is truth. Still whitetail deer legs and eyes--
A bandage, bartenders and whiskey, two pretty men stacked
by the back door smoking. To be separated.
Off-stage, beauty blanketed, almost ruined, replicated
in the mirror, please wash your hands. Posted,
lovewords......healed fire ....men with jobs,
in their play I become normal.
my sundress - my self
You swallow me up and my sun
dress always biased and flirty, falling.
Cotton branching, lycra loosening,
many evil-eyes, blanching, clenching.
Many enviers envying
my plastic ghetto stars & my face
around the goblin-folder
trimmed in cicatrix, lace lighters – tat,tat.
Why compete with me? I’m Rapunzel with a short bob
Just my dress rustling in some girl,
just my dress spilling breath from my pen-i-tent-iary
and then my dress airy and breathless on All
my Children; one hit bleeds from my teeth.
All the rancheros and wall-streeters line up
to screw gorgeous cotton mouth
to fill jugs with water - Llena mi jarra de agua,
fill their mouths with their fists.
All girls green as geckos line up
ferocious in firespray, with shreds of my hair
on their toes. My grief ghosts on the goblin
folder they just tussled from me.
I don’t know what to do about envy, transparent girls
with no eyelids, knives they lick to clean.
Durable cotton, durable girl.
No sabía cómo llenar las tardes.
Not once do I wince. I am dead.
You swallow me up and my sun
dress always biased and flirty, falling.
Cotton branching, lycra loosening,
many evil-eyes, blanching, clenching.
Many enviers envying
my plastic ghetto stars & my face
around the goblin-folder
trimmed in cicatrix, lace lighters – tat,tat.
Why compete with me? I’m Rapunzel with a short bob
Just my dress rustling in some girl,
just my dress spilling breath from my pen-i-tent-iary
and then my dress airy and breathless on All
my Children; one hit bleeds from my teeth.
All the rancheros and wall-streeters line up
to screw gorgeous cotton mouth
to fill jugs with water - Llena mi jarra de agua,
fill their mouths with their fists.
All girls green as geckos line up
ferocious in firespray, with shreds of my hair
on their toes. My grief ghosts on the goblin
folder they just tussled from me.
I don’t know what to do about envy, transparent girls
with no eyelids, knives they lick to clean.
Durable cotton, durable girl.
No sabía cómo llenar las tardes.
Not once do I wince. I am dead.
Sevenling - banana works
He comes home from the Banana Works eyes yellow
as a Palm Warbler, hard to believe, but to be so happy, a father must be real,
which leads me to believe his tsip, chip barely makes it out of his throat
but anything’s possible in Seaford/Oyster Bay, that forensic father leaning there
against the willow whispering how beautiful is the daughter who runs to meet me in the dark
kitchen, fiber-evidence to leave my fishing boat forever and count
bananas and daughters among reasons to tail-wag and cast my net back to work.
He comes home from the Banana Works eyes yellow
as a Palm Warbler, hard to believe, but to be so happy, a father must be real,
which leads me to believe his tsip, chip barely makes it out of his throat
but anything’s possible in Seaford/Oyster Bay, that forensic father leaning there
against the willow whispering how beautiful is the daughter who runs to meet me in the dark
kitchen, fiber-evidence to leave my fishing boat forever and count
bananas and daughters among reasons to tail-wag and cast my net back to work.
