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Chinese junk with a pillar of salt
Suddenly the last poppies had blown away between you and me

By BURNTTOAST
December 14, 2001
The Iranian

A ghost? A rat? The door? Did I latch it?

At Cornell everyone thought he was an Arab. Lost his turban in a sand storm. Blown away. Looking, looking, looking then throwing it away toward the ornamental grasses. Desperation funky walk when it was extinct and talkin' the dirty talk. Trust me I'll be back said sad-eyed Ahmad.

Forget everything you know about tincans and tuna his daughter was looking for him. OH NO a million mad comrades in Tehran singing the blured stanzas of the Internationale. He wore the red badge in Ithaca before he was kicked off the rowing team. He drank and water-skied. He horsed around the campus pretending to be on a pilgrimage for his PH.D.

A rare sirloin steak born a moslem shocked in the Masjed praying in the void for movie stars behind the wooden doors. Coming back to life on the Utah chicken farm the ancient Iranian senator's son ordering Kentucky fried , what a way to cap it off.

He decided to marry me even though I was already married. I ran out of gas . A sleeping Bakhtiari Bibi in Joe's Pub on 14 October, 1954. Black twigs, yellow leaves, plaster peeling off the wall, twiddling my thumbs.

He was a smart ass shooting blanks. He said my mother isn't going to send me money -- my butt really got sore -- because I entered the Ididerot with 69 Canadian sled dogs. It was Mark Twain again from Hanibal, Missouri with pinched shoes in Ephesus.

Gray green thyme spilled over the stones and it came down to the wire. I went to live with him in Ithaca, a nail in the coffin. Wonda flour and presents by the tree with the tribal council on the edge of my seat in cramped student housing.. My daughter sleeping in the bottom dresser drawer. No money. Who owned the blame to put the lid back on?

Suddenly the last poppies had blown away between you and me I heard the bell-like ringing of his spurs coming up my steps of stone. It didn't take long playboy howeled. Light switch turned off. I thought of something strange, nothing more, we were married only 14 moons before I said goodby to him at the door.

Time passed. I drifted to Ming China as white cloud on the yellow river. Junk boats with paper sails beyond the billowing gray smoke . Lights in the night with a blue star. Rain falling on blue and white Shanghai. A Suiboku painting by black Zen priests clustered in mandalas.

I found a rhythm manifest in the living spirit a distinctly rusty voice inside a wheelbarrow carrying shreded Fall leaves, pine needles fitted over a standard garbage can (can not included).

A view of the surroundings was warm yellow China. I just happened to have my camera. Kind of at a loss, I became a pillar of salt.

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