Who could fault the finesse of the false-
eyelash entrepreneur who posts this ecstasy?
collected all the legs from the roaches
that live in my house and finally
created my masterpieces – jumbo
flying roach legs are now for sale!!!
itchy but cute!!
Oh, someone else’s gal, flutter
those splayed spikes over your big brown peepers.
The craft of poetry stares helpless
in the face of #cockroachfashion
#addsmorevolume
#reusereducerecycle
And remembering fashion’s ignorance
of pain, what about those dangle earrings,
each one embracing a pair of teeth?
A child’s molars. My own.
Old chompers exhumed from a box of oddments,
bestowed on you, my one and only.
You wrapped their yellow-white roots
in silver caps slung from airy chains.
It wasn’t as though I had any other use
for baby keepsake teeth.
Just imagine the distress
a consignment shop will endure
after we’re both gone. The owner
lifts the lid, thinks weirdly
realistic! Then looks again.
–
David P. Miller’s collection, Bend in the Stair, will be published by Lily Poetry Review Books in 2021. Sprawled Asleep was published by Nixes Mate Books in 2019. His poems have recently appeared in Meat for Tea, The Poetry Porch, Muddy River Poetry Review, Constellations, The American Journal of Poetry, Lily Poetry Review, Nixes Mate Review, and The Telephone Project. He is a member of the Jamaica Pond Poets.
© 2021, David P. Miller
Halfway Down the Stairs 