November 2009 marks an end of an era at Word Riot: Poetry Editor Charles P. Ries is bidding us farewell. We are incredibly grateful for the countless hours Charles has devoted to the magazine and the discerning eye he took to submissions. He will be missed.
Charles has two books of poetry coming out in early 2010: Girl Friend & Other Mysteries of Love that will be published by Alternating Current Press, Leah Angstman, Editor. And I’d Rather Be Mexican that will be published by Cervena Barva Press, Gloria Mindock, Editor. The following poems will appear in these two books. –WR STAFF
I LOVE
Your grilled cheese sandwiches under
the full March moon, as Jupiter draws
near and we witness its unblinking eye
hovering above the horizon at early dusk.
The way your lip is slightly twisted upward
at one corner making your mouth look like
an irregular right triangle.
Your explanation for washing your bed
sheets three times a week, “dust mites.”
Your mantric complaint about how hard it is
to dress well at 20 below zero in the midst of
a blizzard. Yet refusing to compromise for
the sake of warmth instead sludging, steadfast,
like an Armani foot soldier through road salt,
snow drifts and sleet. Saying, “Some things
will not be compromised!”
Your method of slowly moving, methodically
passing through the house…dusting, resetting
souvenirs, just so. You, the feng shui master
of knickknacks and fashion magazines, creating
a perfect order in the universe of our life.
EXIT STRATEGY
Elaine took me to her German psychic,
as expected, she saw everything.
Our bad days and our glories.
The history of our times and species;
we have been together
for generations.
Realizing how long I have been with Elaine
made me feel tired – I didn’t realize we’d been
working things out for over 400 years.
That’s a long time to accommodate a sentient being,
I don’t care what form I was in; me as:
Her cat
Her dog
Her sister
Her butler
Her mother
Her hair stylist
Gerta saw it all against her inner astral cineplex.
I didn’t know I was once a charming pistol packing pescalero
a handsome Mexican bandit who charmed Elaine
(in an earlier even more succulent form)
to indulge my desires.
Irresistible under a vast pecan tree.
The Milky Way strung over our heads.
I pick the flower she willingly offers me.
We melt into the warm night – two sentient beings
as happy as two souls beings could ever be.
She, the sheriff’s daughter
virgin, sixteen, flawless
filled with secret flames
Me, hanging from a pecan tree
limp, twitching, forlorn
looking a bit bewildered
Too many lives to hold in one small boat.
Yet on we sail, east to paradise
fighting our way toward enlightenment,
the only exit strategy
for two weary souls.
HEARING PERFECTLY
“You’re missing all the high pitched, soft consonant
sounds,” the audiologist told me.
“You mean women’s voices?”
“Well, yes I guess you could say that.”
Isn’t it odd, how men suffer this deafness?
We stare intently with sympathetic smiles watching
their lips shower us in sentences half heard.
I’ve noticed that missing so much of what she tells me
has deepened my affection for her.
Is this what they mean by making more out of less?
HOW TO LAND A MAN
Beauty, intelligence and wit
are the insecticide of mosquito
men.
Who eat their dinner over the sink.
Coveting their:
Old shoes
Worn shirts
Endless routines
Knowing it all
Beauty must wander this
lumber yard of slumbering interest
in soft moccasins.
And in perfect harmony to his buzzing
hum:
You’re so dear
You’re so brave
You’re my exceptional man.
Feeding him a two course meal of:
1. Beauty
2. Adoration
She learns precision as she becomes
the architect of romance.
Rising perfectly each night
evaporating with the sun.
in her costume
of indifference.
BIRCH STREET
Sitting on the porch outside my walk up with Elaine
watching the Friday night action on Birch Street.
Southside’s so humid the air weeps.
Me and Elaine are weeping too.
Silent tears of solidarity.
She’s so full of prozac she can’t sleep and
I’m so drunk I can’t think straight.
Her depression and my beer free our tears
from the jail we carry in our hearts.
Neighbors and strangers pass by in the water vapor.
Walking in twos and fours. Driving by in souped up
cars and wrecks. Skinny, greased up gang bangers
with pants so big they sweep the street and girl friends
in dresses so tight they burn my eyes.
I can smell Miguel’s Taco Stand. Hear the cool
Mexican music he plays. Sometimes I wish Elaine
were Mexican. Hot, sweet and the ruler of my passion,
but she’s from North Dakota, a silent state where
you drink to feel and dance and cry.
Sailing, drifting down Birch street. Misty boats,
street shufflers and senioritas. Off to their somewhere.
I contemplate how empty my can of beer is and
how long can I live with a woman who cries all day.
Mondays are better. I sober up and lay lines for the
Gas Company. Good clean work. Work that gives me
time to think about moving to that little town in central
Mexico I visited twenty years ago before Birch Street,
Elaine and three kids nailed my ass to this porch.
PLAZA de TOROS
The Matador handed me the bull’s severed ear,
a trophy of his victory and the bull’s predictable defeat.
He was called El Tiempo Grande.
They’d saved the biggest for last.
His ear filled my hand.
I raised it to the sky and to the crowd
saluting El Toro’s rage and defeat
at the hands of Pablo Hermoso de Mendoza.
Pressing the bull’s ear to my own, I heard:
the morning of his birth
the pastures of Southern Mexico
the blood as it seeped into the ground
the last glimpse of the sun
the tears as they cut his throat
As they dragged his carcass out of Plaza de Toros,
I saluted him again,
he who symbolized the burden of rage
and the insanity of being born a male.
LOS HUESOS
(the bones)
I sit with the dead tonight. I have
brought my father’s tobacco and
my grandfather’s beer. Between
their tombstones, I light a sparkler
and (with eyes open) imagine them
standing and dancing before me.
So I get up and dance with them,
turning, spinning, and falling to the
ground. As I catch my breath, I look
up to see their smiles shine down
like porcelain stars. They point at me
“There’s our boy, he’s come to
drink and smoke with us. He loves
the lost ones with a heart as big as
heaven and inhales our graves as if
they were fields of red roses.”
The beer widens my eyes, makes
the deep night opaque. Revealing
a tribe of dead lovers who protect
us from devils and demons, insuring
our first communions and last rites,
ready to welcome us back home
with cold soft hands.
The graveyard is full. The living
and their dearly departed sit in tight
family circles telling old stories that
recall ancestors whose names have
now been given to babies.
We pass funeral cards, rosaries, and
wedding rings among us – tiny monuments
to people whose portraits hang along the
stairs leading to the cellar where we make
our candles, crush hot peppers, and shed
our tears.
We slice lemon cake, eat chicken breasts,
and drink tequila in the Cemeterio de Santa
Rosa. The ghosts are all brown, except mine.
Pale faces who’ve passed over – German,
pot bellied, serious white people, who,
in life, had things to accomplish.
We sing and dance to all the dead gone.
Mock death and remember a cast of bit
players who slip into our dreams with
whispers just before dawn.
As I pour my tequila into the earth I see
their spirit mouths open and skeletons
rise to dance three feet above the ground.
White vapor swirling like clouds. Sweet
misty blankets that embrace the tombs
of my family.
About the author:
Charles P. Ries lives in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. His narrative poems, short stories, interviews, and poetry reviews have appeared in over two hundred print and electronic publications. He has received four Pushcart Prize nominations for his writing. He is the author of THE FATHERS WE FIND, a novel based on memory and five books of poetry. Most recently he was awarded the Wisconsin Regional Writers Association “Jade Ring” Award for humorous poetry. He is the poetry editor for Word Riot and a former member of the board at the Woodland Pattern Book Center. Charles is Co-Chairman of the Wisconsin Poet Laureate Commission. He will have two books of poetry published in early 2010: Girl Friend & Other Mysteries of Love that will be published by Alternating Current Press, Leah Angstman, Editor. And I’d Rather Be Mexican that will be published by Cervena Barva Press, Gloria Mindock, Editor. He is a founding member of the Lake Shore Surf Club, the oldest fresh water surfing club on the Great Lakes. You may find additional samples of his work by going to: http://www.literati.net/Ries/
