Poetry

 

 

John McKernan

The US Army Corps of Engineers Map

Of the Missouri River
Contains blue ink but   No water

The banks curves
Depths and sandbars
Are satellite U-2 Google perfect accurate

Down to
The temperature
Of the floating ice
For the days in January   No one

Ever found our neighbors' two-year-old
Child that July on any map   Not even
The ace divers from Kansas City   Whose
Grappling hooks grew sharper
Each time I dared to look

 

Life Is

A soup can in the weeds
Mud with the texture
Of silk   Coffin rhymes
With every word I hear

I love to read the biographies
Of pornographic movie stars
Those beautiful Sirens   As I
Scream with Odysseus   Remove

The wax   but tighten the ropes.
Remember Mary Magdalen?
Wasn't she the one in the book
Who danced & walked on water?

 

 

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