Trent Wuster, Poet

Trent Wuster has taught high school Language Arts teacher in Fruita, Colorado, for the last five years. He recently completed a Masters of Education degree with an emphasis on the study of the Creative Arts. His wife Beckie theorizes that he secretly wants to become a lifetime student since he has been in college for almost the entire 11 years of their marriage. Trent has also spent six seasons coaching various levels of baseball for his two sons Tristan and Tanner. This experience has been more educational than all of his years of college. His interests include yoga, meditation, and hiking. Many of his best poem ideas have come to him while behind the lawn mower. He may be reached at: woozoo4@juno.com.

Empty Lines

From the basement
comes a full-grown
man, crying.
He says he's wet
the bed.
I tell him it's alright...
to cry.

He sets his bone-
colored flesh
in the rocking chair
and tells me a story--
When he was young,
he would steal clean
sheets from the neighborhood
clotheslines
and sell them to small children
for pennies.

I bring him hot milk
and aspirin,
which he dissolves
in his glass.
He says he'll be ready
for the pain,
in case his tongue should burn.

He dries
his lips on his collar
and says he has to go
away for awhile.
He puts on a long coat
that covers his toes,
and drags
a hollow black suitcase.
He promises
to behave.
I wait all day
for the evening news.
As soon as I start to believe,
there will be no trace
of him,
he comes through the door
announcing he has returned
only to visit.

He parades
his empty suitcase
in front of me
like a casket.
I tell him to empty
his pockets.
They are full of pennies.
He points out a particular one
that shines like gold.

I tell him to go
to bed
without any supper.
He says it's alright
to go
hungry
and disappears
down the stairs
to wrap himself
in the dark
corners
of stained sheets.

Mary's Seduction

It may have happened...
later, after
the significance of her contribution
was overshadowed by healings and miracles.

Maybe, on a long desert
journey to see her son,
when weariness weakened
her inhibition,
and when they had crossed
the unmarked boundary
between traveling and dreaming,
maybe a smoldering fire

was fueled by the revelation
of her shoulder
from under the shawl.
Maybe then, she finally understood
the immaculate concept of desire,

and let her hair unfurl
like a velvet serpent.
He broke the divine
tension by listening to the blood
coursing through her heart
while she wrapped his body
in hers and finally understood

the miracle
of the hand washing
across the inner thigh,
finally cupping what he had imagined
as a jewel
still simmering from its formation
near the earth's core.

He laid down with her
to sleep in the brown desert,
suddenly comprehending the grace
of flesh and holiness
of the unwritten psalm.

Unlaundered Blues

Early in the day, at the Lou's All-night Laundromat, the half-
clothed patrons step in from the wrinkle-free silence of
downtown to move in synch to the squeaky blues
of the accordion. The well-trained artisans of sleep deprivation
leave bubbling coffee
and the foamy glow of late-night talk shows to come and
masquerade in their underwear while their clothes dance
aimlessly, endlessly-- cycling on fluff for hours.
They move in smooth, improvised grooves, longing for
the impermanent press
of flesh. The musician strips sound down to the bare rhythm of
raw fingers on exposed keys. He insists he must be naked in
order to fully grasp the limitations of sound.
The dancers pause only occasionally to slip rusty quarters into
the abyss of the whirling machines. As the hypnotic, rumbling
jukeboxes resume, they continue their public display of gentle
tangling and delicate tumbling.
When the officer spins in to arrest them for indecently
exposing a lack of skin cover, they don't resist. The performers
are given soft time on the prison laundry line. Washed in greys,
they spend their days secretly teaching the hanging uniforms to
swing and sway to the a capela wails of the hardened prisoners
who are suddenly unrestrained in the exhibition of their blues.

Separate Skin

It is almost late
October and the night
is crisp like the coat
of the hot peppers
that I now drape
in old plaid sheets--
a midnight attempt
to give the still
green crescent moons
a reprieve from the bite
of the first frost.

I pluck an almost golden
fruit from the arm
of the plant
and crack the flame
across my tongue.

So this is the flavor of the late harvest moon...
The cold silk skin
holding the luminous juice
that will set your flesh on fire.

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