Five Poems by Scott Waters

 

FILM

 

I just cleaned this window

but already 

it’s coated with dust

and a long smear 

where I tried

to wipe off the grime

 

I could clean it again

to better see

the clouds 

and the moon

pale in a moody 

blue sky

 

but that 

would still leave

the grainy film

stuck 

to the surface

of my eye.

 

 

HOW I GET TO THE TOMATO

 

Clouds melt like butter in a pan

sky as blue as Grandma’s pots

the dog whines again to go outside

but I’m too busy describing 

how the dog wants to go outside

a whimper rising to a peevish growl

Grandma had a dog named Willie

and a cat named Whitey

summers down in the cellar

cool and damp

her liver-spotted hands 

placing eggs on the scale 

the arrow leaping to extra large

the dog still wants to go out

to her boxed-in little urban yard

and then she’ll want back in

but Willie roamed free

from farm to farm

sniffing cattails on the edge of ponds

chasing rabbits deep into the woods

emerging into sunlight

disappearing into cornfields

showing up in time for dinner

on the dusky front porch

while the Indiana sun went down

like a fat ripe tomato.

 

 

FIELD OF POEMS

 

The verses

in this world

are legion,

 

numerous

as grains of sand

in your hair

 

or the tiny hairs

on your arm.

Yet,

 

kicking through

the poems

that rise

 

like lilies

up your

ankles

 

to your shins,

you somehow

improbably

 

pick this one.

 

 

SCRIVENER 

 

If my boss 

were to ask me

to get my ass

off the couch

my head

off the pillow

my body

out of pyjamas

and my bathed

shaved

neatly ironed self

back to the office,

my answer

would simply be,

 

“I would prefer not to.”

 

 

BURGER POEM

 

This is not

just another

waiting for burgers

poem,

 

but the best

waiting for burgers

poem

you’ve ever read.

 

If you doubt this,

your money

will be returned

at the end

 

of the poem.

Except,

as everyone knows,

there is no money

 

in poetry.

Scott Waters lives in Oakland, California with his wife and son.  He graduated with a Master's Degree in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University.  Scott has published previously in The Main Street Rag, Better Than Starbucks, The Blue Nib, The Pacific Review, Loch Raven Review, Adelaide, A New Ulster, and many other journals.  Scott's first chapbook, Arks, was published in 2021 by Selcouth Station Press, and his poem "I Could Be Anybody" was nominated for the Pushcart Prize.