Poetry by Howard Good

It isn’t love if our embassy isn’t burning,
if the windows haven’t exploded

in a shower of diamonds from the heat,
if the ballerina isn’t staggering around on stage

as from an accidental elbow in the face,
or if the knife-thrower, subject to ironic applause,

doesn’t suddenly doubt the accuracy of his aim;
it isn’t love if the moon isn’t breathing,

if we don’t receive unsought help from machines,
an automated summons to appear in court

and our bewildered joy upon entering the night
a moment after everyone else has left.

THE PARABLE OF SUNLIGHT

It’s a rare sunny day,
but the streets are strangely quiet

as if arrests have been made,
or are about to be.

Head down, hands in pockets,
I start across the square.

The fountain is dry, stained in dead leaves.
An old man, with the drab, diligent face

of a lifelong student of numbers,
scatters bread crumbs for the pigeons.

I pretend not to notice him – it’s safer –
and in seconds, reach the far side,

where bodies in the early stages of decay
hang like gray rags from the trees.

I glance back at the old man.
He’s watching me, and I wonder why

and whether tomorrow
is supposed to be just as nice as today.

FOR THE WOMAN WHO WALKED OUT DURING MY READING 

To what should I attribute it,an upsurge in sunspot activity 

or the general decay of manners?Please don’t say it was me, 

the dull sincerity of my words,their untreated depression, 

that sent you rushing off.Let me think there was a man 

(with a ponytail, perhaps),a vase of dried wildflowers, 

a bedroom wall on whichyou put a hand for balance 

as you stepped out of your skirt,your micro panties, and then yourself 

and delicately into a love poem. 

 

 

SCARECROW 

How’s it look? I ask,slipping my arms into the sleeves 

of the scarecrow’s battered coat.Good, she says, 

but I already know the truth,and by portentous coincidence, 

the sky has just turned the samedisquieting shade of gray 

as various diseases of the mind.I hold my arms out like so 

and assume the somber expression,including opalescent eyes, 

of someone remembering somethinghe wished he didn’t, 

children overtaken on the roadby claw-footed shadows, 

regardless of ancient promisesand the shrill little cries of the sun. 

 

 

 

A CURE FOR BOREDOM 

Invite a word inside, doesn’t matter which,they all suffer the same strange inability 

to distinguish between bright and dark,the spastic black shadows of a candle flame, 

but if it refuses to tell where the loot is hidden,or even how many birds constitute a flock, 

shove its fingers in a drawer and slam the drawer shutso that neighbors can hear a concerto of screams, 

and when you’re done, and it’s mashed and misshapenlike a nail repeatedly and inexpertly struck, 

fix it a drink and might as well have one yourself. 

 

THE TRUE HISTORY OF CINDERELLA 

Your cheek was pressed to the groundas if listening for the heartbeat of the earth, 

while the king’s soldiers took turns,a dark wetness, and later, after they departed, 

the spreading conviction that there wasa prince, ugly stepsisters, a glass slipper, 

not just these medieval woods, 

where, whenever you walk,the weeping unicorn with the crumpled horn, 

its throat slashed and bleeding,offers its garish wound for you to kiss.

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