Category Archives: Poems by Alan Reynolds

Woolgathering Perils

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The waking dream supposes it is dreamed
by the tourist in the truck bed watching lions
who regard her, themselves wakened when she screamed.
She wrecked the truck attempting to read signs
in Chinese symbols warning, ‘Do not stop.’
The no-doors truck’s a nightmare; it won’t start.
With lions approaching, she climbs the truck’s top
which is not half as high as how her heart
is trying to ascend, with her left here
to face lionhearted felines down alone.
The waiting dream assists her: Paul Revere
provides a silver lining to dethrone
the kings of beasts. It’s catnip. Lions cheer
as Paul and Pauline gallop out of here.

(29th poem for 2014 November Poem A Day challenge)

Bug is the New Thanksgiving Turkey

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The turkey that lurked in the lee of the lemonade stand
through the hum of the summer, and most of the autumn, till now,
appears on my plate, and surprised — existentially here.
I’ve had a lot on my plate, but a livid, live turkey’s absurd.
Should not slaughter, dissection, and plucking precede being served
like a badminton cock, or a locker-room sock that has swerved
through the air with a flare lit to guide it. I guess I digress.
I open my eyes. Tom Turkey stands still on my plate
and for his conviction that we should, like he does, eat bugs
to stay lean, and less mean, and friendlier to our friends the birds.
He flies off and leaves me with crickets, ants, mealworms and beans.

Some People Are Just as Bad as They Can Be – Example nr. X

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He believes in his heart and in other uninhabited regions
(his hoof and his haunch, and, true to the cliché, his head)
it’s ordained that his gang (he prefers people call them his legions)
should invade the next country and make all his neighbours there dead.
Except those he’s seeded. He’s planned this invasion for years.
His discontent with his own life prevents him from valuing theirs,
the lives of his neighbours. Convinced the Apocalypse nears
(in dreams he keeps private for now), he dissembles and wears
his uniform well, with its medals for bloodshed and sorrow.
He smiles at his neighbours and tells himself, ‘They’re dead tomorrow.’

Mad Mackie’s Elevenses

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‘I shall want chocolate biscuits served with hot white coffee.’
(I have been out half the morning harrowing snakes
with ‘adoring combs’. (That’s what the French maid calls them.
(The upstairs maid (‘adoring’ should be ‘Darwin’.
(I’m speaking parenthetically because
it’s Thursday up on Pluto which as a child I did adore.
Since it’s no planet now, adieu, no more.))))
‘The badger’s back. I see it in the garden.’
‘No, milord,’ the butler sighs. ‘A mole.’
I’m out of my depth. I debit depth perception.
I credit Cyril (the butler) with a win.
We are painting politicians’ faces on clay pigeons
for a garden party I have plans to give.
‘If that’s not the badger, that mole’s the badger’s twin.’

Mad Mackie’s Manor

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‘There are a badger, milord, and red squirrels, at the door.’
‘Well, let them in!’ I yell. The butler sighs.
‘You don’t get it, milord. They is wanting letting out.
Your castle is not the keep it was no more.’
I go to correct his grammar. The squirrels dash
the penultimate Ming vase on the flagstone floor.
I help the butler sweep up, handling broom
and crystal dustpan more than handily.
I think the badger likes me, but the squirrels
have convinced him all he wants from here is out.
There’s no pleasing some, so I cry, ‘Fetch the shotgun!’
I send the butler to the village for fresh shells.
The mammals go out with him. All ends well.

Timepiece Cascade

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He had removed his watch so he knew it was not time
that was passing. He could hear the waterfall
growing louder and presumably getting nearer
in the darkness that was everywhere these days.
A duet for two or, less precisely, tutu
rang in his ears — where else? — as he swept past
the islands Bridle Sweet and Bishops Nein.
He heard, ‘Take two aspirin scold me. Yule bee fined.’
That can’t be right, he thought. He reached the edge… …

Staged Right

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We hear the stage direction, Exit right.
We face the audience seldom; it is us.
Beyond the footlights, all we see is night.
From here it looks eternal, as we fuss,

each with our own stage business, and we pine
for speaking parts, and plots where we can lead,
at least a little. Blind directors mine
emotion lodes. They make us cry and bleed.

We take steps that take us further from salvation.
Clapping hands disorient us. We pause,
on the edge of what we’d meant to be creation,
but which our hamming up reveals as gauze

and spangles masquerading as The Light.
We move across the stage and exit right.

Half-Hinged Fairytales – The Giantess and the Beanstalk (excerpt)

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I think that serendipity
rewards no one resembling me.
The wench, whose overweening chest
gives umbrage everywhere it’s pressed,
advances to unjust desserts
adroitly flouncing in her skirts.

Me, the Huguenot, and Thou make three
united ungrammatically
and in our apprehension grave
that hopes we’ll not be made her slave.
The giantess, for such is she,
grunts, approaching, ‘Fum-fo-fi-fee’

the distaff version of the hum
her husband grumbles: ‘Fee-fi-fo-fum’.
Thou and me make haste to squat
behind the hapless Huguenot.
The giantess gives his head a squeeze
that sends his brainpan to his knees

which swell like they’ve contracted mumps.
I am less scared of Heffalumps.
Thou and me hide by a well.
We gather this may not end well.
We kick our wellies off and dive
in the dark and hope we’ll stay alive.