Poetry of Issue 7 Page I
Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead
“Ghosts never die. Their windows are always lit.”
In the right light, she might have
passed for the kind of woman
she wanted to be. Thought years
would vanish if she wore a custom
designed slogan t-shirt that said:
“Kurt Cobain Died for Our Sins,”
under an unbuttoned, sheer white,
silk blouse. Wore form fitting leather
pants. Red high heels. All the most
expensive facial creams, highlighters,
wrinkle removers, known to man.
Wore glossy mauve lipstick and too
much, matching eye shadow, in an attempt
to distract someone from all she would
prefer no one saw, as some kind of
cosmetic sleight of hand trick, in lights
turned down low, lounge. A dull,
incessant, heart beating, techno bass
line/ noise gradually increases as
witching hour approaches and passes,
as the hour between dog and wolf nears,
as shadow men and women gyrate in
something like a St. Vitus dance in overhead
flashing, post rave, highlights. All conversation
on eternal pause, frozen in mid-speech,
as barmen pour iridescent drinks into
tulip shaped flutes and the solo women at
the bar multiply; their acetylene eyes,
their benzene breath, as they press their
lips against glass leaving imprints in blood
wherever they touch, apply eye wash where
they sit, using an acid drip, bold and Teutonic
as Valkyries hitching a ride. Mouthing the words,
“Got a light?” to the only lovers left alive,
the await fire to be applied, drag deeply on
Lucky shorts, in long thin ivory holders,
blowing perfect ovals into the dark, back room,
of just another sad café, all the tables empty
except for the ones three old men sit at, reciting
lines from Sartre plays: the ones the Nazis
didn’t get, the ones the partisans did.