Rae Armantrout
Easily
The models
in the Gentlemen’s Club ad
are posed
with pink mouths slack,
eyes narrowed
to slits.
Show me stunned resentment—
the way
the world absorbs
an insult
it won’t easily
forget
§
Old Woman’s Lament in Autumn
for WCW
Sorrow is my corner store
where jack-o-lantern balloons
get high on the last helium.
The endcap is gold today
with numbered bags
of Werther’s Originals.
No one is Werther.
Last night a newscaster
mentioned an “elderly victim.”
Don’t call me that.
I’m old
and obdurate.
§
To
Girl turned to a tree,
sure, or a vine
turned to a girl.
But what did you mean
by “girl”?
Such slender,
double-jointed
reaching?
Rapunzel
letting her hair down
this wall
upon wall,
articulate
with tiny flowers—
solicitations
never meant for you.
•
Carpenter bee’s buzz,
as its feet
touch pollen,
a deep throb
§
The Garden
Oleander: coral
from lipstick ads in the 50’s.
Fruit of the tree of such knowledge.
To “smack”
(thin air)
meaning kiss or hit.
It appears
in the guise of outworn usages
because we are bad?
Big masculine threat,
Insinuating and slangy.
§
“The Garden” first appeared in Necromance (Sun and Moon, 1991) and then in Veil: New and Selected Poems (Wesleyan, 2001). “Easily” appeared in Partly: New and Selected Poems (Wesleyan, 2016). Both “To” and “Old Woman’s Lament” will appear in Wobble, forthcoming from Wesleyan in September, 2018.