derived from a photo by ann engelman

DANCES WITH BUTTER KNIVES

by Charles P. Ries

They lost me in complexity.

The tribal leaders of poesy read on:

The obsidian blade cuts fog blue

blue whale, blue whale bone, blue sky,

blue eyes, blue island.

The obsidian blade cuts ragged edges

along riverbanks, in the outline

of drifting cotton thoughts.

Too many edges for me. Poets lost in

technique become dull butter knives.

Their spontaneity has turned into yawning

formations.

Soft hushed voices from the female readers.

Soft hushed voices from male readers.

Caressing their butter edged words.

I close my eyes. I follow them closely.

I open my eyes. I give them my all.

I fall asleep. I dream and see their words

wearing lead wings. Bad shoes to dance in.

I wonder, where’s their clown prince? The fool who

works at the car wash? The one who skipped his

PhD in literature and makes me feel lighter after I

bathe in his unwashed words.

~ first published by Concrete Meat Press

EXIT STRATEGY

sculptor unknown: minneapolis

EXIT STRATEGY

by Charles P. Ries

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.

My sombrero tossed casually to the side

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 sentient 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

                        My sombrero tossed hurriedly to the side

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.

~ first published in  The Café Review

WHY I GAVE UP WRITING . . .

artwork: ralph murre

WHY I GAVE UP WRITING

AND JOINED THE CIRCUS

by Charles P. Ries

I left it all; the paper and pens, publishers

and agents who could not love my inner

fantasy and joined the circus.

The make-up, big nose and fancy pants

helped me overcome my feelings of

obscurity. I created an identity grander

than my literary art. I now have something

worth writing about.

I married the fat lady, she gave birth to

a midget; I learned to swallow swords,

made friends with a contortionist who

told me to turn my pens into pretzels,

and live like a real man.

~ first published in Rosebud

THE MYSTERY OF WATERS

digital artwork: ralph murre

THE MYSTERY OF WATERS

by Charles P. Ries

The Black River moved east to the Red Sea

as August crept in on soft hands,

all before a lost tribe of clowns

carrying cartoons and sacred images

high above their heads

             close to the blue sky

                        close to their desire.

Calliope music beckoned them enter the

cathedral that nestled under a grand mustard tree,

as Mary Magdalene flew high above the center ring

Saint Agnes recited the seven truths

Lucifer blew fire and ice

ending the world as predicted by Frost.

Alice, their queen, kept watch -

Alice who knew the secret of grinning cats and wise caterpillars

smoking dope high above the cathedral on tree limbs,

purring to perfection in sitting meditation

             dreaming of dancing mice

                        one minded mischief makers.

I remained silent and floated on to the Dead Sea,

where blood drops become rose buds in bleeding hearts.

Watching ash fall from the hand of an avatar

            snow flakes in August

dusting me white as talcum after baptism.

These wandering mysteries.

            These puzzlements of mind.

Meditations on the nature of rivers and seas,

breezes that dapple my mind in sunlight at midnight.

Will you float with me

On this river of grace?

Belly button pointing toward heaven,

umbilical eye staring into the mystery of love.

~ first published in Anthology

WHEN PENIS WALKED . . .

artwork: ralph murre

WHEN PENIS WALKED THE EARTH

by Charles Ries

I never thought of it as evolving. At least not like this.

Never thought about when it first raised it’s proud little head.

But a 425-million year old fossil found in Herefordshire, England

changed all that. The oldest record of an animal that was unarguably

male made me stop and take stock. A tiny crustacean, only

two-tenths of an inch long -  with an unmistakable penis.

They christened it Colymbosathon Ecplecticos which means

“swimmer with a large penis.”

Scientists say it had copulatory organs one-third the length of

its body. Wow. Makes a guy sit back and think about all the

evolutionary outcomes. The cars we’d drive or the clothes we’d

wear.

Monkeys became men.

Fish learned to fly.

Penises roamed prehistoric earth.

I guess some things never change.

~ first published in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

STARS SUSPENDED FROM BRANCHES

photoart: ralph murre

STARS SUSPENDED FROM BRANCHES
by Charles P. Ries

My grandfather often told us that on the day of his birth they put him
in the corner to die when he, the weaker of two scrawny twins,
came into the world. “But I didn’t die. Here I am,” he laughed.
His brother died a few days later. Funny how death works.

Shortly after my father died, my mother announced that she would soon
be passing, and eleven months later with a slight smile on her lips, she
released her final worry and said good-bye. Death was not in the room.
My mother didn’t believe in death.

At middle age I stand tonight on the field where we played 10,000 soft ball
games as children. Where I called my brother the longest litany of swear
words my ten year old mouth could spit out. I am standing here looking at
the sky trying to remember something.

Maybe stars are the souls of the glimmering dead, or perhaps meteors are
the tear drops of souls soon to be returned. Souls like me who dread their
plunge back into life’s unpredictable sea.

But tonight I mainly think of my grandfather Peter. Who at 94 could laugh
about the day he chased death from his door. He didn’t believe in death.
He died sweetly with a smile on his lips just as my mother did.

As a small boy, I sit under the Elm tree that spreads protecting arms over
my grandparents’ cream city brick home. I watch my grandmother as
she cleans her attic. Hurling, tossing the accumulated treasures
of a life time out the garret window high above me. Beneath her,
and before me, rise a pile of memories, treasure and heartache.

“I’m cleaning up. Clearing out. Getting ready to leave,” she says, in that
succinct way she spoke about everything important. “For what?” I wondered,
until eight months later she died.

Someday it will be my turn to die, and when it is, I will laugh, clean my attic,
and cast away my last worry. I will await release into an ocean of night where
stars hang suspended from the branches of a massive Elm tree and souls
who’ve returned home swing for eternity, shedding tears for the living.

~ first published in Free Verse

BIRCH STREET

BIRCH STREET
by Charles P. Ries

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 senoritas. 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.

~ first published in Nerve Cowboy