Michael H. Brownstein (latest poems)

Michael H. Brownstein

A BET

Night a line of light going nowhere,

a patio of smoke, somewhere a sprig of water,

charcoal colored maize. Early spring

the sky, the moon, the Milky Way.

Early winter frost bitten, a leak of shadow,

laughter in drifting snow. 

                                           Even fire 

on the nearby hillside through an opening,

a flashlight, the person nearby with a lit helmet--

I cannot see my hand in front of my face--

imagines heat and daylight, a nurturing sun,

the winning of a bet we could stay warm

this midnight without the use of flames.

Later we will fish for fish in sand,

pan for gold in air, build a bridge on hard ground,

eat the fruit of the bird and the meat of the seed.

They will laugh at us and that will be OK.

We will win the first bet--remember always

how the judge ruled against the man selling smells.

OUR ARMY, OUR WEATHER

--Napoleon at Waterloo and the Russian interior, for example, Hitler trying to take Moscow and General Howe at Manhattan.
 

Weather our army in time of need,

clouds rolled wire, barbed and content,

until the swamp matches sky, moss and wood.

A wind from the south, December, 

snow melting, snow drifting, and still 

an edge in the cloud field gives way

to something grayer, unsteady and drunk,

and we know how weather changes, how it

will save us, how wind reverts to its nature,

how rain mist freezes, how fog disguises truth,

weather our savior in time of saving.

                       

THE PICNIC

When they sat down, they took everything out of their life--

rocks, moons, great white swans, whooping cranes,

the name of every flightless bird from Guatemala,

space debris and every tome on evolutionary design. 

Soon they had erased the nobody and the somebody.

Even the hard body with thick shoulders vanished in the rain.

Days later—or was it weeks—seconds into minutes perhaps?—

they moved to the thick grass by the swamp’s edge

and fed the alligators raw hamburger meat. This too

came from inside of them, their skin raw and dappled,

a filibuster of tarnish, turpentine and fragrance.

Did you ever eat a worm? No? Then put the pork chop down.

A POLITICAL POEM

The old men of the electrical utilities

share the hat, eat the pie, run over the pedestrian

and eat money until there is nothing left of the rest of us.

THIS POEM NEEDS A REFRAIN

  

This poem needs a refrain,

a homeland, a hat, a hand job.

This poem needs a vagina

muscled with teeth, 

venus fly trap lotion,

battery acid lubricant,

someone to set a tongue on fire.

This poem needs a water bed,

perfect teeth and perfect hair.

This poem is not a bottom feeder, 

a handhold, a hand to hold. 

This poem needs to refrain.