Читать книгу They Is Us - Tama Janowitz - Страница 5

The Small Loaf of an Artist in Society

Two chihuahuas have tiny pillowcases

pulled over their heads with holes

cut out for eyes and noses.

Are they members of the Ku Klux Klan?

We do not know. Only, they must

itchy in this warm dampness,

this summer sprinkled with peppery

flies over the ash can of our lives.

What has blighted the stout cart-

puller, the homebody, the watch cur,

Beware of the Dog, a sign

leading to reticence in strangers.

All is changed, deranged and gone,

even slouches have a political

roll to fill. This is not a country

for old schnauzers or dull doubters

who muddle and fiddle and refuse

to remember the name of the street

they live on simply because they’ve

changed address once too often

and their furniture grows

molds and fungi in a warehouse

in Walla-Walla Washington. Changes!

Get used to them! Some young rabble

rouser keeps yelling in the parking

lot on Twenty-Third street, where

the organ grinder used to play

O sole Mio just beneath the windows

of our mansion and his monkey tipped

his hat in mock thanks for the penny

that we threw him, although he cavorted

on hollyhocks and crushed petunias in

our Moorish garden, but it’s too late

for giving an artist advice, who

having taken on the guise (gorge

and hackles) of a purebred dalmatian,

is polymorphous perverse now, indeed

always has been.

Phyllis Janowitz