Rhythmically Inapposite

by Michael McRandall
Pen Shells
Honorable Mention, June 2007
Judged by Bryan Appleyard


Lana rides a pony in the
cellar
unmindful of the children
who dance circles at the
door —
she wonders if the apathy
is terminal,
or merely, chronic,
but decides it doesn’t matter
since the colors fade
regardless of the
song.

Neighbors stand in line to borrow
vapors
which serve to cover shadows
that have melted on the
floor —
plant roses in her window-box
and water them with undiluted
inference,
Then watch through shuttered
windows
as she finger-paints a
mourning on the
sky.

Lana makes an early trip to
vacant —
where every mother Mary
emulates their father’s
whore —
and withers at the
elementary portrait that is
drowning in the rearview,
as crack-pipes play
a reverential etude to a
fractured morning
buzz.