Edwin Decker , Poet

Poems by Edwin Decker

Sunday, Funny Sunday

Somebody dived for the volleyball
in an awkward manner.

A beer was spilt
on a summer dress.

Two dogs drooled and snarled
and tugged on a rag.

A chicken leg was snatched by a gull.

And a joke was laughed at
By all.

The Pain of You

A leftover bowl of broccoli soup

in the refrigerator.

A novel (The Handmaid’s Tale),

A figurine

A photograph of our weekend in Mexico

A personalized coffee cup
("World's Greatest Sister.")

A wrench (in my gut).
A copy of Howl.

a video store late fee.


Are all that's left of you.
The remnants of you.
The income tax of you.
The litter box of you.

Yesterday

I fished out

the sludge

from the shower drain

just to get a lock of you hair.

I hang on,

to the pain of you

and will not let go
because it is my last taste of you

however sour.

The Day Lust Ran Away
(An Epiphany)

I remember
the day
lust ran away.

We were sitting on the couch
and she leaned over and
placed her tongue on
my neck.

"Stop," I said.
"Jeopardy is on."

She got up
Went to the kitchen
Made some toast.

Leviathon

Come over here
with your colossus
of an ass. Sit

on bed with me
sit on prodigious cheeks
and stifle me. Sweet ogre

Your jowls sag like
punching bags, upon
thy immense chin. Come

to me Godzilla break
me like telephone
poles. Smother me

with oceans of rippling
flesh. Leviathan, you are
too stout for most men

and even I have
difficulty taming
your felonious

caresses. You are a wretched
monstrosity
and you are not of this world.

The Outhouse

The smell
of moldy
clothes is inescapable
in Christina's house

as is the smell
of Christina

who lives in a shack by herself
on the banks of
The Hollerin' Woman Gulch.

Every night
she brings a flashlight
into the dim,
brisk night
to find the outhouse
that has become
as much a part of her,
as
that queer
reek
of a woman aging
in a busted shack
on the crest
of a dried up gully.

And it only
hurts
once in a while
when she is reminded
of indoor plumbing
and how it was. . .

Some thirty years ago
before he found her
--during a lunar eclipse--
legs stretched to the stars
and her dainty fingers
clenched to the headboard
with her husband’s
handsome brother
between her thighs
like a bounding steed.

Suppression
Part 1 – Happinessings

Happy happy sunshine.
Good thoughts only.

Happiness.

Joy.

Peace.

Everything is fine. God is good.

Love.

Happy thoughts for happy people
in Happy Town.


Part 2 – Niceness-osity

I love San Diego.

It’s very nice here.

The weather is warm

Isn’t niceness nice?

Sometimes I want to put my arms around the world and hug it
but I can’t because the coral reef would shred my armpits.


Part 3 – Love and Desire

Where is my ice cream cone?

I do so love vanilla pecan.

Why can’t I find my ice cream cone?

I need ice cream

if I am to be happy and in love

in San Diego.

Brother, can you spare an ice cream cone?

Shark Attack

They found Michelle yesterday.
Her head and a leg, chewed off.

And though her name will not be released until tomorrow, until after they notify the parents,
I know it is my sweet Michelle.

I was on the couch -- wondering why she hadn't called
for the fourth day in a row -- when the news report came on.

The coroner was pulling a body out of the bay.

They said they didn't know who she was, but that there was a tattoo
on her shoulder -- a butterfly.

That's how I knew it was her.

I remembered four nights ago, on my couch, when, like the shark, I chewed on her lips and took off her shirt. I told her

how beautiful the butterfly was, and "Would she see me again?"

I scanned the news, hoping not to see her face, forgetting, sort
of, what it once looked like. Dreaming it now, in the belly of the fish, the shock frozen on her face. Disbelief.

The Coroner speaks on the TV about the scar on her belly,
which he believes is a caesarian, but which I know,
is an old knife wound, because she told me so, as I ran

my finger across it, like a contour map.

I stare at the coroner now.

And I hate him
for seeing a corpse
instead of the way she really was

a robust woman
who sometimes liked to surf alone
in the dead of night
and who entered the cycle again
directly,
via the food chain, and

whose name they will announce
tomorrow
on national TV
after they notify
the family.

In memory of Michelle Von Emster

Lizard

Sitting alone in a cafe in Positano,
Sipping Ouzo
And writing these fabulous aches
in my old Brown Journal.

A gecko crawls across the wall.

And suddenly, for no apparent reason,
My poem feels like
a wheelbarrow full of lizard turd.

Love poem from a different angle

Instead of longing for your sister—

who sits across from us
with slim long legs crossed

—I viewed you through your sister

As if I were dating her
and I was gazing across the living room idolizing you.

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