Strawberry Xanex

(Image above is "Coma Chan" proving once again that fur, nurses and oxygen masks make the world go 'round)


Shuffling dance
with coma
In a hot air balloon.
Squares in a crop circle
Discussing Brubeck.
Heimlich refuting reflux
And wishing for the
Return of jive
Or at least a
Decent tea towel.

The second time you're told you'll
drown in a river of blood
it loses some of its chill
down your spine
the third or fourth time it's
another trash fire in the backyard
and gets stuffed
you poor child you have
lice eggs in your hair
where you no longer reach
cut off at the knees

She glanced over at me
from the easy chair and
I could see no recognition
in her eyes
like one of those old
Viewmaster toys -
rudimentary slideshows
of how she saw me
ka-chunked in her vision -
cabbage in a Winston Churchill hat
potato whistling bowtie
Carbunkle Pete the house dick

"Are you the Un-Cola?" she asked me
melting away all the years
gathered in a stress hump on my shoulders
by reminding me of a time
when ad campaigns not only
mattered but were a way of life -
the Colt 45 Man in a
suit, some kind of James Bond
echo, shooting down rapids
on a raft, but somehow
a bikini clad woman arrives
and Colt 45 Man has a waiter
serving him malt liquor
off a silver tray
the three and a half
grueling hours of football
that this oasis was
sandwiched within were all
just an elaborate illusion
to give life to this
few minutes of true magic