STILL LIFE WITH GUERILLERA, PARADE

Ranks of metal
file down the frozen avenue,

the numb crowds mute
except for an old woman whispering

summer
until they come to silence her,

put out the fire

STILL LIFE WITH HOPE

there is a shine to things,
the street gleams with dying

sirens, & sudden muttering
from horns
brightens into light—
settle
into the river, this rushing
sinuous as the past

snaking away down the long
avenue, & the lone walker

on the phone apologizes,
laughs wait, I am coming,
don’t start without me,

please, now under the dark’s
first star

STILL LIFE WITH CURRENT EVENTS

a big machine growls outside
a lung breathing up what is
in the dark tunnels of water

there is heavy cutting
at the monuments

something brittle
something blurred
passing alone

a torso muffled
by satin overgarments
at the crossroad

& the graces doing
dirty work under
a bitter white star

STILL LIFE WITH RINK

Marzelle the girl is on ice,
being read to by a dancer.

Some lug on the bench
scratches his heel waiting
for a spin.
The speakers
seep something cheap—
white is so white in this dark

& there is another divorce
in the crazy eights
cut in the dull mirror
by your blade

Ed Taylor is the author of the novel Theo and the poetry collections Idiogest and The Rubaiyat of Hazmat. My stuff has appeared most recently in St. Petersburg Review, Southern Poetry Review, Louisville Review, Gargoyle, Vestal Review, New World Writing, and elsewhere.