Michael Lynch

SONG OF SUBURBIA

 

O sock drawers of paunchy, square-fingered mowers, monochromatic sedan drivers!

     May you be spiked forever with rogue golf tees, the ubiquitous Playboy

          secreted always in your depths.

 

O cut-glass decanters of the wet bar! O filament light sculpture!

     O deep blue, wall-to-wall misery smooth as the skin of the inner thigh—

          let no decorator revise you.

 

O fainting couch, green glow of banker's lamp, O Reader's

     Digest Condensed Books tawdry in your gilt spines! O intendance of oak

          paneling, of chenille swag and fleur-de-lis!

 

O furbished stereo console! O high fidelity! O Whipped

     Cream and Other Delights! O Jump Up Calypso! O On The Street

          Where You Live! O My

 

Fair Lady still jacketed and unmolested! Endure beneath the sunburst

     clock and the swirled plaster of the ceiling spangled

          with flecks of light!

 

 

[....]

Michael Lynch

O aquamarine coin of wading pool! O corrugated carport overhang!

     May you share eternally those trellises of summer afternoons

          drowsy with pink blooms.

 

And O split-level entryway, wrought-iron balustrade—glazed bonecage of the landing!

     O soft, skylit corridors and childhoods murdered in each room

          remain, remain!

 

Remain unchanged as the dioramas forgotten in library storerooms, pristine,

     delicate as embryos, dazzling as miniature scenes jewelled

          into enamel eggs.

Michael Lynch

SMALL THANKS

 

Skyline, voluptuary of every morning,

frotteur of horizontal pink vastness,

I have done nothing to deserve

this spring sky wadded

with low clouds & the foil

strobe of distant lightning,

potholes freshly patched,

plum pit & flesh & blossom, young men

beautiful on English three-speeds,

whirr of freewheel, the legacy

of the inclined plane, peri-urban

houses candy-hued between the dawn-

damp hedgerows & the prim

march of garden snails creeping

to unknowable victories or failures.

O lavishes, daywhelm & patron blushes

of A.M. I am small & grateful & among.

Michael Lynch

LOST

 

Or because we exchanged each heart for a series of smaller hearts,

gathered weeds and mosses, chalk-bits and sharpened stones.

 

Or because we found the diamond commonplace, loved stars

of almandine, gaspeite and other semi-precious stones.

 

Or because we let the city's voicings swindle us—

chainlink and trafficsound like the tumbling of smooth stones.

 

Or because we had strung our hopes to the feet of birds,

had boiled each seed before planting, planted wire and small stones.

 

Or because we have always been like this: reeling, sick with want,

shadow-ruffed, pressed into doorways grave as stones.

 

In our defense, the night was tawdry with gibbous light: lewd puck

of moon, each walkway flanked with rampant stone lions.

 

In our defense, shouldering paths through doorways, excuse me

can sound like kiss me— bridled, desirous tones.

Copyright © Michael Lynch. White Whale Review, issue 1.1