THE TAXI
—Russell Edson
One night in the dark I phone for a taxi. Immediately a taxi crashes through the wall; never mind that my room is on the third floor, or that the yellow driver is really a cluster of canaries arranged in the shape of a driver, who flutters apart, streaming from the windows of the taxi in yellow fountains...
Realizing that I am in the midst of something splendid I reach for the phone and cancel the taxi: All the canaries flow back into the taxi and assemble themselves into a cluster shaped like a man. The taxi backs through the wall, and the wall repairs...
But I cannot stop what is happening, I am already reaching for the phone to call a taxi, which is already beginning to crash through the wall with its yellow driver already beginning to flutter apart...
___________________
JOURNEY FOR AN OLD FELLOW
—Russell Edson
Can the old fellow get out of the kitchen? It is an arduous journey which will take him through those remarkable conversations of the dining room; and through the living room, where murder is so common that to even notice it proves one the amateur... Then the hallway and the stairs to the upstairs of dark bedrooms where boats rock at their moorings... Out through the walls grown translucent with moonlight, into a marble world of sheep grazing on the hills of the night...
___________________
THE LIGHTED WINDOW
—Russell Edson
A lighted window floats through the night like a piece of paper in the wind.
I want to see into it. I want to climb through into its lighted room.
As I reach for it it slips through the trees. As I chase it it rolls and tumbles into the air and skitters on through the night...
___________________
THE GENTLEMEN IN THE MEADOW
—Russell Edson
Some gentlemen are floating in the meadow over the yellow grass. They seem to hover by those wonderful blue little flowers that grow there by those rocks.
Perhaps they have floated up from that nearby graveyard?
They drift a little when the wind blows,
Butterflies flutter through them...
____________________
THE TOY-MAKER
—Russell Edson
A toy-maker made a toy wife and a toy child. He made a toy house and some toy years.
He made a getting-old toy, and he made a dying toy.
The toy-maker made a toy heaven and a toy god.
But, best of all, he liked making toy shit.
___________________
—Medusa
Medusa encourages poets of all ilk and ages to send their POETRY, PHOTOS and ART, as well as announcements of Northern California poetry events, to kathykieth@hotmail.com (or snail ‘em to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726) for posting on this daily Snake blog. Rights remain with the poets. Previously-published poems are okay for Medusa’s Kitchen, as long as you own the rights. (Please cite publication.) Medusa cannot vouch for the moral fiber of other publications, contests, etc. that she lists, however, so submit to them at your own risk. For more info about the Snake Empire, including guidelines for submitting to or obtaining our publications, click on the link to the right of this column: Rattlesnake Press (rattlesnakepress.com).
SnakeWatch: Up-to-the-minute Snake news:
Rattlesnake Review: The latest issue of Rattlesnake Review (Sweet 16) is available for free at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, or send $2 to P.O. Box 762, Pollock Pines, CA 95726 and I'll mail you one. Next deadline (for Issue #17, due out in mid-March) is February 15—sooner than you think!
Coming in February: The Snake is still in winter hibernation for January: no readings, no books, no broadsides. Then, on February 13, Rattlesnake Press will roar to life again with a new SnakeRings SpiralChap from Don and Elsie Feliz (To Berlin With Love), plus a new littlesnake broadside from Carlena Wike (Going the Distance), as well as Volume Two of Conversations, B.L. Kennedy's Rattlesnake Interview Series. Come help us launch all of this on Weds., Feb. 13 at The Book Collector, 1008 24th St., Sacramento, 7:30 PM.