Calliope

She hits me
in the face
with a dictionary,
a thick one,
the kind that sit
on bookshelves.
Before I can recover
she asks what I did
with the vowels.

I say I don’t know.
She hits me again,
but harder.
The spine snaps.
Ink runs from my eyes.
Please, the words, I beg,
they’re between
the covers.

I try to write down
what I don’t know for her.
She rams the edge
of the dictionary against the bridge
of my nose and asks again
Alright…I cry
the vowels are in the closet

next to the patent leather boots.
She uses the dictionary
to make a stool
and ties me to it.
She puts the boots on
and leaves
with the vowels.

- m.r. kidd

Freckle on Lisa

So little in life
claims perfection;
flaws demand detection.
Yet seamless work
artists apply
to deny a crooked nose.
But, bantam and lone,
like a dimple in stone,
yours is no mole or imperfection.
In more than dreams
I dream to kiss
the freckle in your complexion.

- m.r. kidd

Freckle Song (mp3) - Chuck Prophet

'(Till) I Kissed You (mp3) - The Everly Brothers

The Pathetically Honest Romance Novel

It’s the same ol’ song and dance;
there’s always a girl with a heart
like an oven, a designer peasant skirt
and a history of just so much hurt not to be
pathetic. The boy is thick
with repetitious morals
but has a fantastic house
and there’s always an English country-

side where he ponders sermons
to give his victims, to make hurts
hurt more, tongue his war wound, his leaving
woman, over whose body his salt swarms.
A thing most strange and uncanny

as pink paper-maché over the breasts
and sawed-off arms on the sewing mannequin.
In the attic the girl must sleep in when not
cleaning she reads the signs that the story
was forged from another language,
the setting changed, the dates updated,
and only he’s there to say he’d never lie

to the fiery wrenched-up girl
on whom the story cannot center
because she’s playing in the parlor
a bourée, a dance that does not exist
in English. She sees past him in the pink
paper filled with Spanish or French or some
other words that are not real and says, God
this story really sucks, and starts
ripping out the pages, the pages before
which the real pathetic
heart is breaking.

- m.r. kidd

Love Junkyard (mp3) - Rickie Lee Jones


The Last Time I Saw Richard (mp3) - Joni Mitchell

Spencer

In honor of Spencer, one cool cat. A good friend who liked to nip my coffee, my scotch, and always, my heart. Don't rest in peace, instead have a good go at whatever you do, like you did when you were here. Cheers ol' friend!

Below is one of my favorite animated shorts, "The Cat Came Back." The song is a children's folk song originally written by Harry S. Miller under the title of "The Cat Came Back: A Comic Negro Absurdity" in 1893. The song is humorous in nature, telling a silly tale about a man who had a cat that he did not want, and when he tried to get rid of the cat, the cat kept coming back. The song is the basis for this famous 1988 short by Cordell Barker.



Also see Cat Stevens - Teaser And The Firecat

Moonshadow (mp3) Cat Stevens

Pink Panther (mp3) Henry Mancini

FYI, I've come to believe, at least in my searching, that there are far more songs about dogs than there are about cats.

What the Cats Aren’t Saying

Of all the ones we bind and morph
they are the ones who mind
us having speech the most. Listen how,
when they stare you down, they scrape
off insults with their tongues.
How they choreograph their every stride
to say they know when and how we’ll die,
saving breath for that triumphant cry.

What conniving prima donnas; hairdos
perfect, licked down in mom-spit, rubbing
body smells on our black pants and spewing
fanatic propaganda. Grace they’d trade in half a sec
for a leather jacket and a nickel plated
Colt held in your face. But here in my office
their fury is patted down and hinted at
only when they shudder back

disgusted at fate’s tone of voice,
despite the scads of cat-prayers ever spoken,
because religions like us to see our souls as cats,
leaping from high to higher wire performed
with pluck and in power of the dark.
Imagine how they must feel:
cock-blocked, cheated, mocked by god.
What they’d like to do is cuss up a storm
but they’re held to tact and dangerous body language.

- m.r. kidd

Stray Cat Strut (mp3) Stray Cats

Speak To Me (mp3P Rocco Deluca & The Burden

Numb Hand

It still pinches, points and picks,
but it won’t play what I love.
How I used to baby it, clean it,
marvel at its tricks. Now it’s just
where part of me ends.

I’m going
to slice it off and wrap it
in birthday paper; it’s a pretty gift.
I hope you can use it for something,
a paperweight, indicate directions,
pin it on your blouse,
“I’m With Stupid.”

It can’t feel
what it’s done to me. Dumb lump
didn’t drop a tear as I handed away
all my veined guitars.

In the bathroom
while I cried I thought it hardly
worth my ass as I snotted out
a laugh. I can’t trust a thing like that.

Be careful around it, it is deadly.
Look how it scratched out my heart.
I would give you both
but I still need my other hand
to cover up that hole.

m.r. kidd

Amputee (mp3) Scott Matthew


The Hand That Held Me Down (mp3) Two Gallants (black sessions)

Hand Made In Spain

Her body is smooth as bone
and smells alive, old, strong
rosewood, cedar, ebony and pearl.
Her butt and bout cut, bound
and twisted, beat back
against my three points of touch;
sternum, thighs, both in and out.
Left fingers, one, two, three,
then four, grip her flat black neck
wider than all electrics. My stronger hand
hovers just above her hole.
Index, middle, ring, and thumb
exchange just so much pressure
and release each other to rest
before the next execution.

But sitting with beauty is never easy;
a maze between wanting and hearing
skin rip, sweat run, the muscle twitch.
Though my freakish posture veils
any real violent motion; the hammer
on must be like breathing.
Exercise secures the pattern.
Sharpened tools and sacrifice
to neatness over speed
have made my awkward habits
come alive until I die.

In space kept humid
I tilt, stroke, flail and pluck
a mass of sound from her.
Such work is worth some blood
and little care for more.
For more time, for tone,
I sit alone behind her body
to which my hands are nailed.

- m.r.kidd


Las Abejas mp3 Augustin Barrios


Dark Eyes mp3 Alexander Gluklikh