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Jacknife Jess

her scab was a brown smudge
the flooring birch and rugged
broken assed downtown
like the door held up on its
gate hinges with industrial
screws

dont ask me about it
she whirled in with a world on
her hard hip
the smoke from lifes roadblock
fires still in her long cascade
of molten hot hair
black as a fallen angel
the chipped tooth softening
her smile

(like an escapists file)

bending ballerina style
forward to extract a power
drink..
she snapped it open without
breaking a nail
or her smile

called her "jacknife"
cause thats how she started
the chevrolet
thin enough to slide under
the bumper ahead of the
tigerpaws
arcing out the leads
the three oh five sizzling
shivering to life

crack my zippo and light
her Pall Malls she carried
half in and out of her
lowriders

stare into my eyes
like she was looking for
a mirage
sedan shaking
from a gasket leak

sucking in too much
vacum

she had eyes
that turned all the stillness
into a torrent
of a hot hiss
like a fresh load of
chips in a fryers first
embrace at
A and Dub

somewhere between
pure lust and lost
love
where they put the
special cars in the
wrecking yard
between the pick ups
and the wagons
rare
parts

turn up a smile
on one corner
and walk slow to slip
behind the wheel
always catching my
eyes watching those
hips
the gravel dust
like club glitter
in her hair
constellations
like the jagged
blade edge
she welded
emotions from
our contact
jumping
the distance

Editing stage: 

Comments

Jesus Steve what are you trying to do to me, I so want someone write a poem like this about me I think most women would, She's beautifully devilish she's raw and untamed and ingrates herself in everything around her I wasn't sure she was a woman or a thing at first and I guess I am still not a hundred percent sure lol

Fucking unbelievable I missed this last night its so so so so good, no GREAT !!!!

Bookmarked I will be visiting this one again I know :)

love JC xxx

“The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.” — W.B. Yeats

one of your comments was about ugliness and or the mundane..
fifty years of moving ang grooving...not in the rush high end like some
im not that bold...i give in easy to things...i sit and collect stories
and to become a part of a chapter or a paragraph in peoples stories
one had to pay or have to pay.....everyone wants to live at the carnival
everyone wants the attention..everyone wants to be wanted....

only those that worked carnivals or had to bust a nut to survive to have
the large dollar capacity to roll the machine that large knows..
or those that dedicate their lives to settling in...waking at five in the
morning..look after their people and go to bed at nine ..every day for
years and years.....(of this i dont know anything about..)

dreamy eyes and realities eyes are different..

but everyone has dreams.....everyone takes breaks

these characters i wrte of are facets of people i either lived with
or around enough to have an impact on my life....a coffee here
and a meal there....all of them are intense and caught up in some
vortex that fires about them like a light and they are the diamonds
the jewel the treasure of persona and character that fires so
beautiful...

i read the commercial works of stienbeck and plath and sexton
and others....works polished by other poets and hard hard hard
hard hard work by the poets themselves.....they were not just
dedicated..they were driven to move their stuff out there..because
it was money....because they knew they could do it...did do it..
those writers were the top of their heap but the manner of how
they wrote..how they described for the people about the people
at the time was amazing..

i have not read much of the greater classical works
milton..poe...a handful but i did carefully go through all the books
when i was in my teens and twenties after work and school
weekends and summers....

my writers i like which are modern are..Atwood and other
miscellaneous Canadian writers for scene more then dialoque
...Rebecca Godfrey...."The Torn Skirt" a writers daughter
this is who i borrow for the sketchs.....like Varley a Canadian
painter of the twenties..his vivid portraits i like... Rebeccas
character sketchs are amazing....I always give credit when
credit is due...It is her work i am emulating in my own manner
but my character is larger then life.......I have met only a few
number of truly people whom stand out to be their own stories
....and with their dazzle came all the issues and problematic
moments that would not have them living on a couch or rooming
with the ordinary people..they are too much.....

the characters i sketch here on their own are in depth and require
much story telling to set them in their settings..
when writing think of setting or theme as the ring..
and the character the exponent moment like the diamond
the emerald the moonstone the jade that is the centerpiece
not always.....sometimes the ring itself is the dazzler behind
the centerpeice.....aside from meaning and sentimentality
just about what the ring and centerpiece means.

then the whole presentation of the story or poem for me
is like how that comes to be..evolved...
some hold their rings out and wiggle them around
thats nice.....or some put a hand on a hip and slyly just
allow their rings to be seen.....

meaning....theme.....without meaning for me my work is abstracted
like sketchy notes stuck to a board with a few words....
thats not published style work that people associate most with
poetry.......form and all that.....title and punctuation etc..

i live and know rules...i just accept that i do have intuition
and intelligent to move about there and work in that very
interesting area beyond the rule..the norm..

these people.....whom i have met and have known
survive vivid in memory because they slam me out of
my comfort zone and their moves have been either
accidental or very practised...there is beauty in smoothness
the blissful glibness in moves...

for some of these or all its survival moves..

like gold mining....ninety per cent of rubble and extraneous
material one has to move..crush...left with for the magic
moments of the gold dazzle razzle..that glitter and value..

i guess im a surface miner..i just know where to look
and im lucky.....but there are those that can move a mountian
and do it...\they want it..

ha ha ha.. everyone has a hobby

was it worth it to meet all my characters in real life
and then use GODFREYS style and manner of writing
which im sure she has influences for....in real life all
these meetings cost something dear...or were given
in extremely rare cases for that magic moment..

i believe in God.....not the crosses and all that
but of something greater then I for a purpose
which is not a disneysque story...but for me
to figure out.......society spoon feeds us with
commercial need...need a smoke..here it is...
underground smokes..cheaper...
same smokes either way...booze..sex..drugs..
synthetic or the real....pharma or the underground
...

facets....when the right light shines on that facet
story telling.....
setting that light...mood..

i shake my head....i could have turned bitter
jealous...but i hung on to some goodness
no one wants to really steal that..
everyone makes a face or fun..

because its too real..

thanks for enjoying these poems
and asking about them

\mr \esker

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