Nixon Birds at a Quaker Pig Out
by: Dom Maltempi
5-22-09
one grandmother
a harridan who had recently made a doll of me using broken children
lied to her granddaughter
through her teeth
\ all of them
not about what’s in a ‘Golden Gate’ shot
she stopped caring about those years ago
but about the source of a crackling whoosh
of a spoiling din
the sound did not issue from three great gray birds moving to Los Angeles
as she reported
her voice modulating in a sweet sifting high octane wheedle snap
but rather the sound of pork flesh and grease
a
skillet gusher stove fire
not great birds moving
a stove fire
black and used red
a retiring sponge’s malodorous song done in smoke
i heard it all over the phone
before cooling my brow
thin cold white towel hangover eyes