Wes Holtermann
BOYS |
First we must pick a son
from all these lined up on the shelves like yogurt. Some bald as stones, some with dollops of hair, each one leaking, each a different color. It is so hard to tell which will wind up handsome, which sickly, evil, indolent, which will radiate unstoppable joy. We rifle through them for hours. This one here is irrational and crazy, this one arrogant, cleaning its fat foot with its mouth. This one is made of red jelly and disgusts me. Here is one with a pianist’s slender hands. Soon, all the good sons will be picked through. Down one aisle are the slightly off. A cross-eyed one, one bowlegged, one with ringworms. Aisle two is filled with creepy stout babies pumped with milk, in mint condition. Down the third aisle are those who have been mutilated. These are quite something. A unique style of child, like a bonsai tree. There was one down aisle four with interesting green eyes, but his penis was so small. Finally we find him around closing time, big and sparkling in aisle seven, and lug him up to the register. I look him in the eyes after they bag him up. You will be my son. You will carry my ridiculous yearning bones and swim them out. You will be strong of body, broad of shoulder, and you will bear this little weight, build a house with my remains in the abysmal prairie, give tours occasionally, occasionally get the fireplace going, halls decked with all my stuffed and antlered winnings, and sit and watch it burn. |
ANT WAIST
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I have become so obsessed with the body, my purple guts
are going sour in a Tupperware in the break room, so I take them to the marina and watch the pelicans carouse and slurp. What use have I for them now that you have made me a moth, more wind than will? Ian wants an ant waist meaning a body in ballooning segments like a bug or a botched K-pop tween. It will make him more desirable as a dancer, so he’s not eating much these days. It makes sense for Ian, but I want a body made of meat I can slap against other meat bodies. I want a body that can’t spill, can’t be punctured. I want a body that if cut in twain will become two living bodies and those two might be enough. |
NEVER NEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP
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Un-cry these tears, cardboard NASCAR guy
in the corner of the taxidermy bar. Whiskey mashes my face like a fist. Pour me a soda could you? I can feel my blood sugar dipping. Here is a camouflaged geezer named Cooter. Talk with him about rifles. He will ask you why all poems are about horrible sadness. There is a deer head above the sink in the bathroom. Into his eyes I try the mantra, pull the diagram out of my pocket, trace the lines. Remember when it got so bad you had to press your face against the cold marble floor in front of all the financial district commuters? On the other side of the door someone is karaoke-ing “I Love this Bar”. Someone else pumps a fist in slow-mo with closed eyes. Try living in the world like it’s fundamentally nurturing. Now imagine it is devoted to you. Imagine when Cooter gets up and sings Barry White – how a beaten rug might sing dust – he is the vehicle through which the world is singing to you. |
WES HOLTERMANN is from Berkeley, California, where he works at a nursery. His writing has appeared in the Kenyon Review, Lumina, and Into the Teeth of the Wind, among others. His chapbook, Mouthfeel, in collaboration with artist, Rebecca FIN Simonetti, comes out this spring.
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