Reb Livingston

 

 

 

Lament for Fronting

 

O Damsel, how is your torso . . .? How you tiptoe! O Maiden, how is your torso . . .? How your slip shows! O accomplished woman whose benefit now annulled, how do you abide? O Nymphet whose downgrade unnerves your higher priestess, how is your torso. . . ? After your benefit annulled, now how do you abide? After your indulgence, your warmth and interest, how is your torso. . . ? Your tabernacle unworshipped, now how do you abide? Your altar turned to syrup, how is your torso . . .? You are not the prized tulip in a field reduced to turnip rounds. You cannot wakeup beloved in a meadow reeking fish. You cannot pose as impune to those who sowed before you.

 

 

 

Lament for Bust

 

"Because his language mistreated me, I once suckled a shepherd like a woe-dodo competing with a miscreant. My tenderness consummated fracture, birthed my alien nation. Because there was a tempest in my meadow, I bleated into my cleavage like a love-struck lamb bleeding; and my vessel ceremoniously packed with princely trinkets; and a gigolo rose among tomatoes. Because the language of the Tempest was abandoned and slack, I undreamed the entire event and weeped "Greeny trespassers stole my utensils! Oh darling spatula!" The Tempest's poised speech flattened, relieved.

 

 

 

Lament for Mutation

 

Regret is me, my meadow no longer mews – I am not its love-struck lamb. Woe-dodo no longer subsists – I am not her mistress. I am not the apron whose kitchen is fraught of plundered drawers, "The mancatcher, somewhere I had a mancatcher!" I am Sultana of the Shepherd, matron to the lambs, opponent of Woe-dodo, captor of the Picknicker whose blanket stained my kinglet, in a place where the Miscreant is one hypnotic tomato.

 

 

Lament for Must

 

The Sultana, after she scribbled the poem for her thinking thingamabob, her one-time hearttrob, she scatters humbly a lament for the dead meadow, her home dubbed asylum: "The Tempest who introduced himself – his language flabberghasted. Compelled to buckle because of the Tempest, I am the Sultana for whom the Tempest thrummed to be – his language mistreated me. The macabre Tempest scrubbed in hush, I numbed for gust but did not depart. Because of this vantage Tempest I could not salvage a beholder, not one Savage beheld."

 

 

 

Lament for Hush

 

The Tempest who tends no apron, the Tempest who tends no concubine, the Tempest who tends no woe-dodo, the Tempest who tends no miscreant, the Tempest who tends no love-struck lamb, the Tempest who tends no tomato, the Tempest who honors no womanish consorts, the Tempest who released the mancatchers, who released the mewing ewes, who released the trinkets like fishy food, the Tempest who released the bogeywomen into the kitchens, the Tempest who flicked the dohickey, ordered in pang by Thingamabob – afflicted Shepherd persona, may that Tempest no longer spin his lingual whispers in your depraved-spoken meadow. May your dismal-throated tendrils shrivel forevermore.

 

 

 

Lament for Them

 

The Woe-dodo vanished from the Shepherd and lets the Specter deliver her mandates. The Concubine vanished from him and lets the Specter deliver her mandates. Miscreant vanished from that apartment and lets the Specter deliver her choking mandates. Love-struck lamb vanished from the meadow and lets the Specter deliver her mandates as baaaad little sonnets. She of Pang vanished from him and lets the Specter deliver her mandates against all wretched desire. Apron vanished from the Shepherd and she eats all the Specter's sighs with bitter, choppy sauces. Ewe vanished from the pen and lets the Specter mew her mandates gently. The Shepherd vanished from the good book and mandates his beckoning Specter delivering all sorts of compromise.