Editors' Note: Read Boston Review poetry editor Stefania Heim's interview with Wayne Koestenbaum.
[desire demands specialization]
“Salmonella”
sounds like a bitter drag queen
_________
orange
tractor in twilight,
stichomythia, dialogue as
failure
___________
don’t wet
your pants when you
get excited telling
a story
___________
of Melanie and the
Carpenters I sing—and
of hours later, and their
resemblance to hours ago,
and foretelling’s resemblance
to forewent—
___________
of Triscuits and the delight
they fail to bring
I sing—
__________
of
several rich houses in
a row, their improbability
and then their disappearance
and the mourning that
ensues—
___________
of editorial
suggestions and micro-
abrasions, of Lasik
and softball—
______________
am I
aware of the royal baby?
_________
and why did I
mention Judith Butler
in Brooklyn? and why
always a reliance on
ellipsis?
___________
she sent me
a photo of her baby
boy’s rear-end
___________
I overstated
my “culture of the
pause” idea, and didn’t
explain it properly
___________
of another
stagnant tractor, this one
yellow (Indian or Naples?),
I sing—
_________
of West Point and man’s
second or third disobedience—
_________
of his refusal to thank or
greet, and their Germanic
likeness—
__________
of The Monster and
Uncle Julius, and
my failure to write a fashion
poem I sing
_________
the wife’s mouth
qualifies as pretty, but
it disturbs me, as do
her pink ballet slippers,
and his loud
crunching on chips
_______
a trip
to Greece to see the
oracle and give it “a
piece of our mind”
________
of sewing
skills and knot-tying expertise
never acquired I sing—
__________
of dents in my
Bach trumpet, of a tendency
to hoard, and the cult of impersonality—
__________
of pineapple’s
resemblance to male peacock
figuration—
_________
imagine an uncle
named Ruth, and imagine
that mistake as a
cause of fluidity
__________
how can I finally seize
the day, is there a day
to be seized, have I
already seized it?
______________
is it already night and
too late to seize
the day? is there a difference
between day and night?
___________
I seized six o’clock, but
now it’s half past eight—
________
maybe
stuttering came
from wearing a foot brace
________
what
if John Cassavetes had
made Garden of the
Finzi-Continis and what if
Julie Harris were
its star?
___________
let’s stand
against recollection—
in our bib overalls
remember nothing
___________
drum up intensity
to prove
I have a body
__________
like fire on fingertips
as evasion
_________
do local divinities
embrace my foul
entirety?
_________
sponges
are never antiseptic
enough, wrists are never
limp enough, dreams
are never wet enough
_________
Stickney’s
restaurant, my mother
orders tuna fish sandwich
as treat from block-
lady waitress Wanita—
___________
pink
boxes are always fancy—
fancy means
(in San Jose) a cake
box or a second story
______________
in a world of one-story
houses a second floor
is nirvana
_________
Mother calls to say
“I’m in a very
“I’m in a very
terrible mood,
I want to
talk to you”
________
not wanting to seem an
east coast snob,
I didn’t mention Heidegger—
_______
nectarine or peach?
uncertain about
the difference
____________
are nectarines
less orange or more,
or is orange not the
primary variable?
________
husband’s
dark eyebrows, “dirty” legs,
wedding ring
___________
elegy for husbands?
___________
“desire
demands specialization” I
said to three dozen men
in a southern crab bar—
___________
square heads of the idealized
and lauded
____________
man in back of room saying
“after-effect” silently
to himself
____________
tell me more about Hamlet’s
desire to be a woman
