BROOKE SPALDING / MISSOURI PASTORAL: 5 POEMS
PRAIRIE MADNESS [SCENE 1]
mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead * mead mead mead mead * mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead * mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead * mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead * mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead mead *
*places to breath in the lustre
Bread and Circuses
My McDonald’s-whore complex drools up
supper during the big football game
I deflower ice cream and scroll
through xnxx on 10 mg of stimulants with one hand
down my pants the other holding a wet beef
sandwich with provolone that smells
my fingers two hours minimum
TV before bed my own arms unresponsive
when a man reached for my tit
while my husband fell into the disappearing prairie
the only mortadella left in Missouri
the only acceptable dream getting away with greedy names
of native plants: goldenrod, asters, honeysuckle, passion
flower cigarettes in the car kissing friends far away
I hear the cowbell din calling* ! * ! * !
dinner’s ready for dreams where I’m mannered
to the cornfield man who assaulted my
red truck parked in the gravel no matter how
hard I fuck my husband I can’t stop itching
the mosquito bites on my knees.
Missouri Pastoral 05: Minibar
I show up already stoned in my unstimulated plaid dress. I come draped in the scarf I just finished knitting; alpaca, lilac, soft, my ends, unweaved, swinging as I slide into the booth. My momentum only feels stifled by my husband and his refusal to let me ride in the bed of his truck.
I had tightly fantasized my entrance into the bar as I knit the last stitches: purl, I would wear my plaid dress, knit, cotton with the drop waist, purl, navy and lilac, knit, spread and battered by highway speed, purl, tossed in the cold metal of his red truck, knit, smoking a joint, purl, mystically touched by midwest wind, knit, perfectly tousled and spat before people I wanted to impress, purl, knit, purl, knit, purl.
At the bar, he orders me a fernet and coke without asking. If he would have asked, I would have said, A fernet and coke, please. At the bar, I order a Crispy Dog and they say it will take ten minutes or so. Being at a bar is waiting for treasure. Waiting induces an inkling for smokes, another treasure. Smoking requires stepping outside and standing in a circle against a cold wall. Someone has yellows to share even though none of us smoke. Someone else nods and we obey the calling like little ducklings. I pretend I’m not thinking about the red truck.
Wind currents form around my nose and into my lashline, my hair flaps like a bird–beats the shit out of my face, but gives my expression a curtain to hide. My unfinished scarf keeps the back of my neck warm, but wants to be as untamed as my hair, wants to be a bird, so keeps trying to get as much wind under its rows as possible. Time to think. Time travel. This is what I had envisioned going to the bar. My husband told me I could not ride in his truck bed–not in the city, not in the cold. I was so annoyed that I almost didn’t get in the truck. But, having other visions to fulfill, I acquiesced. I climbed in the passenger seat and stayed silent. Unsure why this made my heart sag.
Crispy Dog! Crispy Dog! They call me to my food. I think about changing my name to Crispy Dog. My husband and I take turns biting while the table talks about longhair dachshunds being crucified and men choking women til’ they’re blue, or whatever is talked about after you’ve received all your treasures for the night. Fried shallots scrape down the lump in my throat and I dread the ride home. I slide my tongue over the teeth of what I said before arriving. We are all one drink away from too drunk to drive, the kitchen now closed, the only hope is another cigarette. We step into the wind.
What is it about the damn truck bed? Idk it’s like Missouri chivalry. Growing up, driving my own red truck in Peculiar, small-town parades, having a grandpa with an excavation company; I chaperoned and was chaperoned in the open air of big rigs constantly. A prom queen, supine, watching the lights of the city scan and flee her; the weight and the danger of something so ordinary; bouncing on no cushion; being thrown around but safe; summers in small towns, at the whim of the truck’s suspension and the care of the driver.
It is still, technically, winter–but not in spirit. It’s one of those nights when a bit of warmth settles on the shoulders like a wet kiss–a small taste of the intimate humidity. A small picture window into sweet-tasting Missouri spring.
The snow starts hailing sideways, carrying my cigarette smoke to the west, forcing our circle to grow tighter against the brick wall. The snow should be another sign I was wrong in my desire for the tailgate, but I don’t take it as such. I inherited stubbornness; the snow is all the more reason this night is
thin
With a line from Sylvia Plath
I saw death on saturday’s edge through a slit no thicker
Than an anchovy filet I had just changed my screensaver to
Goya’s dog I had just put on a red cotton shirt I had been asking
Do you ever forget we die? as a stoned bit I strained my ears to listen for
The black paintings but only heard my father’s truck idle
By powder blue with a bumper sticker that read Milk Drinkers Make Better
Lovers that’s what death sounds like to me: Missing
Bricks slivered shadows in the late afternoon when my stomach
Has distended and I lay fat bellied in the tub shimmering
with herbs eucalyptus and myrrh smells as the butcher measures and marks
My skin staring at Goya’s dog I discovered it was not looking up
Pleading for some god but his pupils were wholly absent sunk
Dull knife the butcher juliennes carrots and compares them to match sticks
He dreams up as he goes along until the knife had pared/the moon to a rind of little light.
Ass-Up in the Garden [Missouri Pastoral 69]
nothing is softer
than a penis, ok? maybe the petal of a peony
but otherwise, untouched
wet wet spring cigarette butts float
in the ash
tray–who gets addicted to tobacco
at 27?
a delayed poet
who misses her husband whose [husband] fingers in twilight alone
could make her ugly cry [I wish I could give the reader a petal–then they would understand]
a wife craving
another pendulum swing [swing? nonononono]
open marriages are looking trendy but also tasty? [I heard you’re not supposed to ask
a question in a poem]
but who counts as a question
the peony bud
is on the edge
of effloresce,
what keeps it tight?pressure
Brooke Spalding is a poet and essayist from Kansas City, Missouri. She is considered “Missouri Hot” which makes the Midwest her final resting place.