Sample Poems by Lesley Jenike
Luck
be a lady. Or be a chump and let it all ride
on this horse right here, dapple grey, power-house legs
long and hot as Miami beaches. Be a man. Be cruel. Be a
doll and get me a sandwich. Be a soul
and search yourself. Be a religion. See white
everywhere, white linen, white hands, great white
screens that replay Casablanca goodbye kisses.
Be a good girl and turn on the lights.
Be a good boy and turn them off again.
Be a jewel and lose yourself so I can know
what it is to search you back to me. Be a tree
in Havana I’ll never rest under.
Be a knife pressed into my back so my life spins by
in black or red, black or red, but what number?
Bye-Bye Birdie
The army’s got you now
So the Lord came down, said, Lemme make you
sovereign of Heaven and I said, Man, take me back
to that long brown torso of a desert, Jordon a scar
dragged through the land and I would’ve kissed him,
would’ve held a sign and waited on the tarmac
for his plane to land ‘cause, Lord, see if you can stand
when the wind comes in playing a man playing
a woman playing the guitar all hips and lips and
ass. You be his bitch, his décolletage glowing star-
bright symbol, his choir of teen angels singing
in paradise forever. “Do you know how to twist?”
Boy, do I. My little river and fruitless lake
can mambo even in the middle of a horror
of a winter when the sky is an eye clouded over
and mother comes in, just as his song pitches
a fit on the radio. The phone’s tucked between
my jaw and shoulder and I’m talking to God
and I’m telling God I’ve loved more. More
have I spent so bye-bye now to my holier-than-
thou baby digging his pin into my naked chest
saying, “Now we’re going steady. Now we’re official.”
Kismet
We were meant to meet at the Desert’s Martini Rock, that
holy of holies, that colossus. The sun burnt our backs as
we turned toward Baghdad. Babylon’s swinging
paradise waved goodbye. You called light light.
You named the lamp, said my love is a lion-share.
I aped you. No rib was so talkative. You said,
Be quiet and listen. Honey’s being made.
So I sat down with a good book, oldest story
there is: cities burning. Masts of salt sail the Sinai
away. It’s fate. I thought I had a witness but
I’m all there is. We stopped by the Sahara Club,
cocktail before Genesis. When I fall down
drunk, when I seize, stop me from swallowing…
Promise me we’ll meet here, say Valentine’s
of each year. Each year we’ll drag in, an unplucked
splinter in your eye. A jet will buzz over. I might
hold you but Baghdad’s so hot that time of year.
I would rename the chasm. I would rename the thrush,
but kismet tucks its fingers in my mouth. One dead root
caused this. One sweet too many kills. Tear it out.
I’ll suck gas, won’t feel a thing. Sleep, sleep, there, there.
You’ll tell me to groove out to the soft rock, creation-
lite, easy-listening, barely breathing. Across the abandon
brush catches fire. Witness. It’s your voice I hear.