Five Poems by Rustin Larson

 

The Weasel

 

These others you meet with their flower antennas

and struggles with an environment of stone hot enough

 

to bake bread in the wall of the mountain

where ice and snow was once permanent

 

they thrive still and they are still

my cat dreams and twitches his feet

 

he knows how to make voices emanate

from the lavender magic box

 

where the Egyptian signets are stored for safe keeping

I ride the bus past the Methodist church to the center

 

of the boring city where young pregnant women

swim in the pool at the YWCA

 

I swim there too and then after buy a brownie

from a vending machine in the hallway

 

the cavern of the indoor pool reverberates

with the high chatty voices of pregnant unmarried women

 

white, black, brown, yellow and on charity

these are the days of deli carton coleslaw and rewarmed pork ribs

 

these are the calendar squares

of three fruits a day and a half pint of milk for growing bones

 

the dairy has a gigantic fiberglass Guernsey cow

in their front lawn lighted by security lanterns

 

in the high crime district of tennis shoes crucified

Gilbert and Sullivan are the two elected representatives

 

we buy tickets to sit in the airless gymnasium

to hear them sing

 

the state of Florida is shaped like a Luger

in the sunshine of confusion

Scheduled Power Outage

 

Did I not understand

why did not the power go off and leave me powerless

 

the elk were chased from the undercarriage

of the mobile home

 

the park was alerted

the sun rose in a mist

 

all was in readiness

I practiced making coffee by the table spoon in a worn mug

 

three hot air balloons floated above the clouds

nothing was caused and nothing ceased

 

time was backwards

the men discussed things over the trench of earth

 

and smoked cigarettes

the occurrence was delayed apparently

 

the grass grew in spite of it all

if I ate mice I would not have perceived anything amiss

 

or out of the ordinary

although buildings burned to the ground

 

decades ago grew back

the menu at the cafe was suddenly cheap as 1955 in June

 

the graves were smooth

the farmers spread cow dung on their fields from a little red wagon

 

hawks dropped from the utility poles

to clumps of foxtail and prepared their meals

 

which was also a thoughtless prayer of gratitude

basketball was played on asphalt

 

as the smaller children swung on a gate

in the schoolyard and wild buckwheat grew on the edges

 

of the courthouse yard with gooseberries

and poison fairy mushrooms

The Light

 

through the blinds

slashes across the page

like stripes

of a shadow flag

 

this is the elfin art camp

with liberty and justice

for owls

 

meanwhile that ocean

that ocean

how about that ocean

 

my friends from California

used to stare at me

like amazed gophers

I can't explain this

 

I rode home on a Boeing

but that was a billion years ago

when the birds were chirping

so now we have failed to make every place America

although we sure gave it a go

 

I can barely remember eating pancakes at Sambo's

before the Michigan-Iowa game

in 1969

 

landslide people walked to get an armload

of medicine

in the park

it was an animal planet

and I'm not saying I was in favour of any of it

though you can develop a nostalgia

for macaroni and cheese

 

and that it is just super weird

by the way

none of this is factual okay

stay calm

they are not coming to arrest you

yet

 

gold roaster and goldfish

and I have bad news

the house didn't sell

and what do I have to say

that isn't another windmill to attack

with a jousting lance

on horseback

 

volunteer mulberries weld their shadows

to the side of the next hovel

 

we made a Mount Rushmore of mud

complete with our tired faces

Art Center 

 

The banana monkey

the purple panther

and the golden giraffe on the rope bridge

spanning the heaving ocean

 

the moon shines like the sun

I dip my feet into the ocean

I feel the miles and miles of water

there is an excellent faith

 

boats come to rescue me

I've forgotten who I am

meanwhile the gray kitten sleeps

next to me in a bucket of bait

 

postpone the election

the telegraph wires have fallen

Teddy Roosevelt is riding

his horse in circles

on San Juan hill

 

the potato chip factory

has burst into flames

at the hands of Sandinistas

Trotsky washes his hands

before he pats out your tortilla

 

he gave a soldier a watch

before he executed all the others

for retreating before the white army

 

canaries the size of professional wrestlers

are tapping at the door

with pamphlets that say Back To Godhead

 

I buy a chocolate malted

at Wind River Junction

next door to the metaphysical grocery store

it's a good day

 

I have a compass

that steers me to fish and chips

by way of authentic bagels

at the White Fish and Capers Deli

in West Des Moines

a sled ride down from the art center

in January

when I thought art equalled money.

Pete Seeger Plays in the Background

 

1.

 

I am a hermit.  I am quiet.

The leaves stir as young days will against the blue sky.

What scheme do they put on before the mirror each morning?

 

Lincoln builds his first cabin in my backyard.

A girl in yellow walks.

A number of scars divisible by three.

 

2.

 

Two tiny human beings are lost on their own planet.

Many people are enjoying the flowering.

Eye shadow; mascara; repeat; the bruises on the cheek.

 

The chirping of sparrows in the eaves.  A dog barks.

In the courtyard birds are singing, and bullets

crisscross the streets outside.

 

3.

 

Later, after the family of seven has been

slammed fifty feet into the median, do we hear the syllables?

Help yourself to some strawberries before they rot.

 

Cooler days are ahead.  I am frightened.

Or do we feel adrift on a piece of debris

floating unspotted and unidentifiable

 

4.

 

amidst everything that has been?

No balloons aloft.  A robin calls out as the sun dips.

The mind in time is an elusive animal.

 

What is that?  What is that?  What is that?

For fourteen years an old woman wheeled her fragile

wire cart behind her.

 

5.

 

The catbird gives long sermons.

A small sack of groceries with a stick

of French bread and a bouquet of celery.

 

A cool wind scrambles all the leaves.

There is a dragonfly the size of a woman’s slipper:

a transparent blue, a subtle bronze.

Rustin Larson’s poetry has appeared in The New Yorker, The Iowa Review, and North American Review. He won 1st Editor’s Prize from Rhino and was a prize winner in The National Poet Hunt and The Chester H. Jones Foundation contests. A graduate of the Vermont College MFA in Writing, Larson was an Iowa Poet at The Des Moines National Poetry Festival, and a featured poet at the Poetry at Round Top Festival. 

He is a poetry professor at Maharishi University, a writing instructor at Kirkwood Community College, and has also been a writing instructor at Indian Hills Community College. 

Among his published books are Library Rain, Conestoga Zen Press, 2019 which was named a February 2019 Exemplar by Grace Cavalieri and reviewed in The Washington Independent Review of Books; Howling Enigma, Conestoga Zen Press, 2018; Pavement, Blue Light Press, 2017; The Philosopher Savant, Glass Lyre Press, 2015; Bum Cantos, Winter Jazz, & The Collected Discography of Morning, Blue Light Press, 2013; The Wine-Dark House, Blue Light Press, 2009; and Crazy Star, Loess Hills Books, 2005. 

His honours and awards also include Pushcart Prize Nominee (seven times, 1988-2010); featured writer, DMACC Celebration of the Literary Arts, 2007, 2008; and finalist, New England Review Narrative Poetry Competition, 1985.