Kristian O’Hare

 

 

In the Lurch

 

Even the creeping myrtle
doesn’t stand a chance against
the lily-of-the-valley
as it storms the lawn, a cluster
of dark-green lanceolate leaves.

I lean on an old birch tree,
slightly hiding, nervously
picking at the peeling bark;
skin shedding like old paper.

Mom unyielding in her habit
of silence finally wields
the hand trowel & cleaves wild
into the spreading mass.

She wrings bell-shaped flowers
from their stems & wrangles thick
twisty roots; the pipes of couch grass
rhizomes white & wormy like
tentacles of a sea creature.

Dad, sleepy-eyed stoned, steps outside
to check on the status of
mom’s mood, lights a smoke & after
a few angry drags finally
asks “What the hell are you doing?”

She doesn’t reply; she holds tight
the silver blade & thrusts it
deeper into the loamy soil.
Dad snaps the Kool mentholated
from his lips, finger-shoots it
into the neighbor’s lawn.

He looks at me, shakes his head
& goes back inside the house,
slamming the door so hard
I hear picture frames fall from
the walls, glass shattering.

Finally I join her,
digging clumsily with a spade,
we tear up the rest of the lawn,
a floral massacre—
desiccated buds & limbs,
chunks of rock & confused worms.

Afterwards a release,
we both feel it, we achieved something,
a sort of victory.
She smiles at me, or dad
who now stands right behind me.
We breathe in the last sweet breath
of perfume silent as strangers.

 

 

In//Patient

 

               In a flung slumber,

his head droops
heavy like a peony.

                              One window: A broken pane patched with paper.

Knobby buds poke their little noses
                                             through a pocket-holed lining.

An operculum
shaped like a shell,
               finger-lobe

its lipped edge.

He heaves                      bent
                                             like a broken chair.

 

From silvery-haired drops
                              cobweb-like mycelial
                              strands & stretched saliva.

A flap of sporangium ropes//                  upright & slanting—

Conidia in the air, their triangular teeth
               clenched.
                                                                 Through thick-walled rope, this wretch wormed
                                                                                                         taut & slack///all criss-cross all tangle,

It rolls crop full of honey,
               brushes of its legs all floury
with pollen & lips chapped
               a white-peppered crumb.

A trowel its tongue       //coaxes//
                                                                                     the clawed petals
                                                                 all feathery white unfurls.

It inflates sac veined dark pink &
               exudes the blistering juice

                                                                 into his flowered crust.

Wait for the breathing bloat to
                                                                                     relieve this night hideous.